The Hardest Part of Love
by TheLordismyGod
Summary: After Sherman starts losing his memory, Peabody discovers he has disappeared and has go on a journey of discovery with a new Sherman who has no idea who he is, or does he? And who caused the memory loss in the first place?
1. Author's Note

Welcome to my magnum opus. I only had an outline for Ransomed Memories, but I had an outline for the chapters and even a character sheet for this fic describing the general direction I wanted to take both Peabody and Sherman and the personalities and arcs of any OC's I created. I just really wanted to up the production quality on all levels. I've been wanting to write this story for 3 years now. I officially started writing this mammoth in February 2018, but of course it was stewing in my head occasionally throughout those 3 years, so I think it probably took me less time to actually write it if I hadn't thought about it for that long before.

As for the origin of this idea, well, it's not actually mine, it came from Tumblr, from various posts by someone known back then (and still now luckily) as disney-diligent. I was going to send them an ask letting them know I've completed it so they can read it, but unfortunately, as of this writing, they have completely locked down their Tumblr. I can't send asks and can't message them. Maybe if someone who they follow sees this can message them and let them know I have FINALLY written this story they probably won't even remember. So, this is directly at you, disney-diligent. If you ever read this story, I sincerely hope you like it and that it at least somewhat fits your vision for what it would have been. I first asked you years ago, WABAC in 2015, so I saved the ask in case you forgot and/or don't have access to it/can't find it on your account for whatever reason, so I will transcribe it for you here:

* * *

thelordismygod asked

Hi, I was wondering about that MPaS sequel AU I think you were

working on a year ago, did you ever ﬁnish that? Like make it an

actual fic and post it somewhere? Or was it just in bits and

pieces, because if it was I'd REALLY like to ﬁnish the rest of it,

maybe fill in the gaps between the posts you made. is it ok if I do

that?

disney-diligent answered:

Ah, so you are one of the ones who's been covering my

notifications with MPAS stuff.

First of all, thanks for enjoying my ideas and drabbles. I still get

surprised when one of my 'Storees' gets compliments from

people. Especially this one that is kind of old.

Secondly, I only just kind of put my storees out there for fun and

for others to hopefully have fun. I barely to never have time to

flesh out an entire fanfiction, so I add drabbles to give people

ideas of what I see.

Third, if you feel inspired to try to flesh out a story, be my guest. I

don't like to harbor or limit one's creativity. I just ask if you are

taking actual passages of my drabbles (like a copy/paste thing) to

leave a credit somewhere. But by all means, be free with it. Have

fun and enjoy.

thelordismygod

Thanks!, I was going to credit you even for just the idea. But it'll probably be

awhile though, I'm working on other ﬁcs atm as well.

* * *

As I said in my reply, I was going to credit you for even the idea, but I still decided to copy, paste, and edit certain parts of your posts to work in my fic. You might recognize them unless you forgot, but hopefully I've integrated them well enough into my own writing they won't even be noticeable.

Mr. and Mrs. Harper are the names of OC's that disney-diligent came up with, I simply expanded on them. All other OCs are completely mine.

Time is a fickle thing, and since time travel has never been scientifically proven to work or be possible, the way it works has been varied throughout all of science fiction. As such, in order for this story to work, time will work radically differently to the way it did in any of my other stories. Just… try not to think about it too much.

I stuck a sort of 'directors commentary' for each chapter showing how the story changed as I wrote it at the end.

Anyways, I proudly present to you, The Hardest Part of Love. The title was inspired by the chapter of the same name from Promissa Fidel's "Of a Dog and his Boy" drabble collection. Only my interpretation of the phrase is muuuch different... Other major story inspirations came from Meet the Robinsons. I poured my heart and soul into this fic. I really hope you enjoy it.


	2. Amnesia

**October 3, 2013**

Sherman was growing frantic. He checked his closet, the number one place it could be. He checked behind his dresser, it wasn't there either. Finally, he poked his head out his bedroom door and shouted down the hall. "Mr. Peabody! I can't find my trifold cardboard display! We can't go without it!"

Sherman had a science fair at school today. He was supposed to present a mockup on how fiber optic cable works, which had been an idea inspired by them getting the internet and network through the whole building upgraded to fiber optic. Peabody had been ecstatic ("We can finally collaborate on our scientific research with our other locations faster and easier!") And because Peabody found it exciting, Sherman had too. But he couldn't show anyone how his model worked if he couldn't find his cardboard display.

Peabody was in the kitchen preparing breakfast when he heard his son yell. He resisted the temptation to roll his eyes and instead gently put down the mixing bowl, being careful not to spill any pancake batter, and walked down the hall to Sherman's room.

"Sherman, what have I told you about yelling?" He asked as he stopped at Sherman's doorway.

Sherman sighed. "To not to…"

"Correct. We do not yell because that is an indolent way to communicate and it is also disruptive. You could have just walked down the hallway to the kitchen, Sherman."

"I know, but I can't find my cardboard display Mr. Peabody!" He whined.

"Which I can also help with of course," Peabody said. "you placed it by the elevator last night so you wouldn't forget it, do you remember?" he prompted, smiling gently.

Sherman suddenly remembered. "Oh yeah…" he sighed in relief.

Peabody put his paws behind his back. "It is alright. It is normal to forget before important engagements. But even if you didn't bring your display, you are still going to be presenting and can answer any questions anyone may have, which will build up your communication skills. And that is just the very first step on your path to building a respectable list of reliable and reputable references for what I am positive is going to be a bright career for you in science." he said, smiling widely. "And you don't have to worry. We are not late, I still have time to make breakfast before we need to leave for the school."

Sherman didn't know what half of those big words meant, and it was partly alliteration, his father's second favorite thing besides puns.

"What's a reference Mr. Peabody?" he asked.

"A reference is a person with whom you share a professional connection. They are invaluable in one's career path. They can help you find and get a job through their recommendations, among other things…" Peabody replied. He put a paw to his chest. "I of course have many references, one of which is President Obama himself."

He put his paws together and smiled. "Anyways, I will let you know when breakfast is ready."

Sherman smiled back as Peabody walked back down the hallway. Ever since the time continuum incident a month ago, his father had become a lot more… 'vibrant' is really the only word Sherman could think of. He smiled more and was a lot more affectionate towards Sherman, except when they were in public. But Sherman didn't mind that one bit, he preferred it that way too. They were both similar in their dislike of public displays of affection. He had also finally relented on Sherman calling him Mr. Peabody and said Sherman could start calling him dad if he wanted to, but Sherman still called him Mr. Peabody simply because of 7 1/2 years of habit.

Sherman did some final checks to make sure his science project still worked as it should, and then Peabody called him for breakfast. After eating breakfast, Sherman quickly shouldered his backpack, gathered his project and carried it in a plastic bin to the elevator while Peabody carried his cardboard display.

They took the elevator to the basement garage level where they deposited both items into Peabody's special car and drove to the school and parked in the rear parking lot.

They took the bin and cardboard out and entered through the rear doors. Suddenly Sherman began to get butterflies in his stomach and become very nervous.

"I'm scared Mr. Peabody." He whispered as they walked through the empty hallways of the school toward the gymnasium where the science fair was being held.

"It's your first time being in front of an audience. You have what's called stage fright. Don't worry, everyone has had stage fright before." Peabody said.

"Even you?" Sherman asked, amazed his father could be afraid of anything, they had gone through more perils in their time traveling adventures than anything in the present-day and his father barely ever broke a sweat.

Peabody chuckled, "Yes, even me. However, I got over my stage fright fairly quickly. Just imagine I am the only one in the audience watching you, just like when we've rehearsed at home, that should help." he said comfortingly.

"Okay…" Sherman said uncertainly.

The science fair was set up so that people could mill around and look at the various exhibits, but there were also a few exhibits that were going to be presented to an actual audience using the stage inside the gym. The school had opened the option for anyone who wanted to present their project. And at Peabody's encouragement, Sherman had entered his. Winners would also be determined, and they would get a ribbon for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place. Observers could stand and watch from among the other exhibits, or they could come forward and sit down in the chairs in front facing the stage.

Peabody and Sherman walked to the backstage where Peabody placed the cardboard display down and Sherman placed the plastic bin next to it.

"Well Sherman, break a leg." Peabody said.

Sherman looked at him in horror. "Why would I want to break my leg?"

Peabody laughed. "Oh, I don't mean literally break your leg, it's just an expression that means good luck."

Sherman was confused. "Why would breaking your leg mean good luck?"

"I'm not exactly sure." He put a paw under his chin. "Well-wishers typically say "Break a leg" to actors, musicians, or any performers before they go on stage. But the origin of the phrase remains obscure. The expression reflects a theatrical superstition in which wishing a person "good luck" is considered bad luck." Peabody explained.

"Oh," Sherman said. "weird."

Peabody smiled. "Regardless, I'm sure you will do well." They were alone backstage, so he quickly planted a kiss on Sherman's forehead. "I'm proud of you… no matter what." He said quietly.

"Thanks Mr. Peabody." Sherman grinned. Peabody smiled back and left to go sit down in the audience.

He sat down in one of the front seats and waited.

Soon Principal Purdy walked up onto the stage.

"Welcome." He addressed the small audience. "We have a handful of students who are going to demonstrate their science projects on stage here today. A small panel of judges will determine first, second, and third places winners based on how well the presentation is given, how well the project works, and how well the student knows the subject. Good luck to all of them."

He walked off the stage.

Soon enough the first child with their presentation began to setup with some assistance from a couple adults. Peabody watched them, but of course he was waiting for Sherman's presentation, which was last.

Before long it was Sherman's turn. He walked onstage, setup his project with some help from the adults, and began.

"H-hi. My name is Sherman and I will be showing you how fiber optic cable works." He walked over to a little laptop computer. "My dad recently upgraded our house to fiber optic cable, and that helps him do his work faster."

He typed a couple keys and then moved to the middle of the table and began to explain his project.

"Fiber optic cable works by taking a beam of light and bouncing it off the glass fibers that are inside of it. I have two very shiny mirrors facing each other that will reflect a laser that will hit this light sensor which will make the computer type a 1 when it's on, and type a 0 when it's off, that's binary, which is the language computers speak, Mr. Peabody taught me that…"

Peabody smiled as he noticed Sherman begin to sink into a state of excitability, talking about a subject he was passionate about. There was no room for stage fright. He watched as Sherman talked and demonstrated how it worked as he did, making the laser rapidly turn on and off, bouncing off the mirrors and hitting the light receptor, and noting how the computer stored each second off as a 0 and each second on as a 1.

After a few minutes, Sherman suddenly faltered. "…and that's called… uh.."

Peabody frowned and quickly noticed something strange. He leaned forward and squinted at Sherman. Were his eyes deceiving him? He could swear he could see the faint gray wall of the back of the stage through Sherman's body!

He looked around, the other people in the audience didn't seem to notice anything, they looked too enthralled with Sherman's presentation to notice.

He quickly jumped off his seat and ran toward the stage, motioning to Sherman, who noticed him and walked over to the edge and leaned down.

"Sherman are you feeling alright?" He whispered.

"Yeah, why wouldn't I?" Sherman whispered back. "You're interrupting my presentation Mr. Peabody."

As Mr. Peabody looked at him he noticed that Sherman no longer looked translucent.

"It-it's nothing Sherman, my apologies." He said. "And the word you're looking for is attenuation."

"Oh yeah, thanks Mr. Peabody." Sherman smiled.

Peabody returned to his seat and Sherman resumed. "…and that's called attenuation, which means some of the 1s and 0s get lost along the way."

Peabody found it hard to concentrate on the rest of Sherman's presentation. His thoughts were filled with questions and all he could focus on was watching Sherman and making sure he stayed opaque. Why did that happen? The more he thought about it, the more uneasy he became; because the only conclusions he could draw was that there was something wrong with time, and that terrified him. What if Sherman disappeared completely?

"…that's how fiber optic cable works. Thank you."

Sherman ended his presentation and Peabody smiled and clapped as the audience joined him. After the adult helpers assisted Sherman with putting away his project he came down and sat next to Peabody.

"Congratulations Sherman, that was perfect." He smiled.

"Thanks Mr. Peabody." Sherman grinned back. "But why did you ask me if I was alright?"

Peabody turned to him to reply, but just then Principal Purdy walked back up onto the stage.

"I'll tell you later." He said.

"We're ready to reveal the winners of the science fair!" Purdy announced.

"The third-place winner of the green ribbon goes to Carl Robinson and his model of a volcano!" He held up the colored ribbon.

The audience applauded, and Carl wheeled up onto the stage and Purdy handed the ribbon to him and he wheeled back off.

"The second-place winner of the purple ribbon goes to Louis Hansen and his potato battery!"

The audience applauded again, and Louis walked up onto the stage and Purdy handed the ribbon to him and he walked back off.

"And finally, the first-place winner of the blue ribbon goes to…" He paused for dramatic effect.

"Sherman Peabody and his model of fiber optic cable!"

The audience applauded its loudest yet, and Sherman smiled wide, almost as if he couldn't believe it. He looked at Mr. Peabody who smiled widely as well and nodded toward the stage. Sherman took the cue and ran to the stage, where Purdy handed it to him and he walked back.

"Well, that is all folks. Thank you to all the students who participated. Feel free to continue looking at the other exhibits." Purdy said, and then walked off the stage.

Sherman picked up his project, set it up again on one of the empty plastic tables, and then spent the next couple hours demonstrating it some more. Peabody didn't really do much other than chat with the other adults there while he waited for Sherman. It was a half day and classes were cancelled so as soon as Sherman was done they would go home.

Soon the gym had emptied and there were only a few people left putting the chairs away.

Peabody finished his conversation and walked over to Sherman.

"Are you ready to go, Sherman?" he asked.

"Yeah, can you put it away while I get my school bag? I left it in my locker." Sherman asked him, jabbing a thumb in the direction of the gyms doors.

"Of course." Peabody replied.

Peabody put away Sherman's project and talked some more with the few adults left but then excused himself when Sherman didn't return.

He pushed the swinging doors to the gym open and entered the empty blue and white checkered hallway, the claws of his hind feet clacking on the tile and slightly echoing down the rows of lockers.

He knew where Sherman's locker was, so he made his way there. But as he rounded the corner, his stomach jumped into his throat when his eyes fell on Sherman in front of his locker, kneeling down.

Sherman was see through again.

"Sherman? Sherman!" Peabody yelled at the semi-transparent boy.

The redhead seemed to not have noticed his state, rummaging through his school bag contentedly. He didn't even raise his head at the sound of his name.

The dog approached carefully, lest his son disappear completely.

He laid his paw on Sherman's shoulder, and in a flash, he solidified. "Sherman." Peabody said firmly. Sherman turned his head to look at his father.

"Yes, mister? Can I help you?" he replied curiously.

Peabody snapped his paw back, horrified. "Sherman? You don't-"

And as quick as it had gone, the realization that the dog standing in front of him was his father came back. "I don't what Mr. Peabody?" Sherman was completely confused by his father's frantic eyes looking at him.

Peabody shook his head, "N-nothing Sherman. Let's go get your project. We're going home." He needed to get back there and solve this problem.

Just what was going on…?

As the day progressed, Sherman continued to have small instances of memory loss, each time lasting longer than the previous. Peabody was beyond worried, and at night began to seriously consider all the possibilities of what was happening.


	3. Goodbye Promise

**1 Month Ago**

It had been one month. One month since he lost her. And it was all **his** fault.

He hadn't heard from Peabody since then either.

Granted, it might have been an accident, a glitch in the machine.

But still, Peabody was the reason his daughter was gone, probably dead.

He had dedicated his energy to creating a time machine. He wanted to be the first to invent a real, proper one before Peabody, and he thought he had finally done it.

But he thought wrong.

Cans of Red Bulls littered the floor as he sat in his lab typing at his keyboard when his assistant ran in.

"Rich, you should watch the news."

"Why?" he turned to him.

"Just watch, turn to channel 10."

He grabbed the remote for the small TV in the room and turned it on.

Immediately a newscast showing a red ball in the middle of New York came on and a newscaster spoke.

" _This is just in; a giant blue wormhole has appeared in the middle of the street and what looks like historical characters have appeared out of it. Mr. Peabody, the world renowned genius canine has caused quite a stir in the middle of NYC tonight when he flew an object that looks like a big red ball and crashed into the middle of Central Park. Apparently that big red "ship" is a time machine of his own invention. But after flying it into the wormhole that formed, he restored the time continuum and sent all the historical people back to their own time. After he returned we were able to catch up with him and have him explain all of these events."_

Immediately the scene switched to a newscaster on the street at night, showing Mr. Peabody, surrounded by a bunch of police officers, and another family he didn't recognize, a father, mother, and daughter.

The female news reporter addressed Peabody.

" _Mr. Peabody, what happened here tonight? Could you please explain for everyone at home?"_

" _Certainly. I realize that there is no hiding it now. I have created a working time machine. You may remember my presentation a month ago at the NYTSE, where I presented my prototype of a wormhole generator. I was able to traverse the whole stage in an instant. Well, the WABAC," he gestured to the giant red ball hovering behind them. "is a time machine containing that technology."_

"NO!" He threw the remote at the TV, breaking the screen.

He sat down again with his head in his hands, locks of his long brown hair sliding between his fingers. After a second he yelled out in frustration.

"How far along are we?!" he asked angrily as he quickly got up again and turned to his assistant.

"S-still a month out."

"Well let's work faster!"

* * *

 **Present Day**

It was a usual night. Another school night, so no time traveling. Sherman had finished his homework, had Mr. Peabody quickly check it over, and now they were almost finished with dinner. The sounds of the city below could barely be heard by the father and son. It was completely normal, but the dog was still uneasy.

"Mr. Peabody are you okay?" Sherman asked, "You didn't touch your dinner."

Peabody snapped out of his thoughts and noticed a cold plate, "Oh! Well," he coughed, "I've just-I don't feel that hungry tonight, Sherman…Well, come on." He jumped down from his chair and walked over to the boy's and took his hand. "Let's get you to bed."

"Alright…" Sherman grumbled.

After a quick shower he was in his pajamas and brushing his teeth. Peabody began to pace in his bedroom office. What were those instances about? What was going on with Sherman's memory loss?

"AAAAAHH!"

Sherman's scream broke Peabody's processing, and instantly the beagle ran down the hallway to the toothpaste-mouthed boy.

"Sherman what is going-"

"AAAH WHERE AM I? WHO ARE YOU?!" The boy began to back away frantically.

"What do you mean 'who am I'? I'm Mr. Peabody! Your father!" He tried to grasp his son's shoulders, but the redhead trailed backwards to the hallway.

"No, you're not! YOU'RE NOT! SOMEONE HELP ME-" he ran down the hall and turned to the nearest door. Peabody pursued.

"Sherman! Calm down-" but the door was slammed in his face and locked.

"Sherman! Sherman!" He jiggled the handle and banged on the door several times, desperately, "Open this door!"

Suddenly, the door clicked and opened, and instantly the dog grabbed the boy and held him close.

"Mr. Peabody?!" Sherman yelped. "What happened to m-"

"Sherman! Are you alright?! Do you know who I am?!" Peabody said as he pulled away to look into his boy's eyes.

"Yes?! You're Mr. Peabody, but what happened to me?" Sherman asked, fear all over his face.

Peabody internally sighed in relief. "What do you mean?" he asked.

"I was brushing my teeth one moment and the next I was in front of this door and you were yelling!"

Should he tell him? "It-It's nothing, Sherman."

"No, it's not! You've been acting **really** strange all day since the science fair! What's going on?!"

He should tell him. "Alright. I will tell you, but first finish brushing your teeth." He sighed as he led his boy back to the bathroom.

Soon, they were both walking back into Sherman's bedroom.

"You've been having… memory lapses." Peabody began.

"What are those?" Sherman asked as he crawled into his bed and pulled the covers over himself.

"They are a phenomenon that can occur where the brain does not create any new memories." Peabody said, smoothing out Sherman's comforter with his paws, not wanting to continue. He chanced a glance at Sherman and saw he was watching him solemnly with wide eyes, expecting him to continue.

"But, that's not all, you've been… fading out." It sounded silly saying it out loud.

"What do you mean?" Sherman asked.

"You've been partly disappearing, becoming more transparent, which has coincided with the memory losses."

Sherman's eyes widened. Smart as a whip that boy was. He drew the same conclusion Peabody did.

"Is something wrong with time?" he asked, eyes as round as saucers.

"I… am not sure, but I cannot think of any other possibility." Peabody said.

He sat down on the edge of the bed and put a paw on Sherman's hands.

"But I assure you, if you disappear completely, I will not stop until I fix it and bring you back." He said, fixing Sherman with an intense gaze.

Sherman's brows knit together. "What happens to me if I disappear?"

"You would cease to exist, and maybe an alternate you might form, one that I never adopted… and I might not even remember you." Peabody said slowly.

"So…if a different… 'me' formed, would you adopt him too?" Sherman asked, brows still knit together in concern.

Peabody couldn't tell if Sherman was hoping for a certain answer to the question or not, but he still decided to answer truthfully.

"No, I wouldn't for two reasons. One, if I was aware of what happened, I would be working on trying to restore the previous timeline version of you, 'this' you right here." He laid a paw on Sherman's shoulder. "And second, because of the sheer amount of work I went through to adopt you the first time, that would only hinder my work on restoring the timeline."

The look on Sherman's face told him that probably wasn't the answer he was hoping to hear.

Peabody quickly tried to dispel any problems. "But that wouldn't be you, he wouldn't know me."

Sherman looked confused now. "But, it would still be **me,** right?… would you not love him?"

Peabody didn't know what to say to that. "Sherman-" he wavered. A rare thing for him to do. "Of course I would. Yes, he would still be you. But at the same time, he also wouldn't be you. The Sherman I adopted."

Sherman still looked worried and was about to say something else; but Peabody stopped him, attempting to put the issue to rest.

"In this hypothetical situation, I promise to at least look after any versions of you that may form to the best of my ability." He said, as if he were vowing to tell the truth in court. "But you don't have to worry, I will figure out what's going on and fix it before anything drastic like that happens."

Sherman smiled. "Thanks Mr. Peabody."

"Anything for you, my boy. Goodnight." Peabody leaned forward and kissed him.

"I love you, dad." Sherman said, suddenly pulling him into a hug.

Peabody didn't like the fact that his eyes moistened just slightly but put his arms around Sherman all the same; holding him tight, as if that would cause the fading and memory lapses to stop.

"I… love you more than anything on this planet." He whispered.

He walked over to Sherman's door but stopped and looked back. Sherman had turned over and Peabody couldn't stop this feeling of dread as he looked at his son. After a few moments he closed the door and walked over to his own room and flopped onto his bed, utterly exhausted mentally and emotionally.

Unfortunately, fulfilling that promise would come sooner than Peabody wished.

* * *

The next morning Peabody awoke with a headache and feeling incredibly dizzy. Groaning and holding his head, he stumbled through the pain and went to Sherman's bedroom to wake him for breakfast but found a gym instead.

"Wha-?" The only possible conclusion flooded his mind and he became panicked. "No, no no no!"

He ran through the penthouse looking for Sherman, only to find it completely different from the night before. Pictures of Sherman and their adventures on the memory wall were replaced by degrees and awards. The living room, once filled with toys and action figures, was completely clean. Finally, dreading to confirm the conclusion he had drawn but rushing to the elevator all the same he pressed the button for the floor that should exist. Waiting for its destination he kept trying to stay as calm as he could but once the doors opened his fears were actualized.

There was no hallway… there was no WABAC… and worst of all…

There was no Sherman.

"NO!" he broke down, falling to the floor, sobbing.

Prophet was not on his very long resume, but now he might as well add it. The very thing he had predicted had come true.

At least he still remembered Sherman, that was a start.


	4. Unrequited Affection

**2 days ago**

" _Is it ready?"_

" _Not yet Rich, it will take almost a full day for the machine to calculate all the possibilities and reduce the butterfly effect."_

" _Well, I've waited for this moment for 2 months now, what's a bit longer?"_

" _Are you sure about this? We still don't know how it will affect us…"_

" _I've told you before I don't care! That dog has taken her from me! I will take the same from him!"_

* * *

 **Present day, October 4, 2013**

"Sherman! Breakfast! I'm not going to call you again!"

The yell just barely made it to his subconscious. His eyes opened just a sliver as waking overtook him. His brain caught up and he comprehended the words that had been yelled.

Once that happened his eyes opened completely. They fell on the old wood of the bunk above him. He quickly sat up and placed his feet on the rug. Stretching slightly, he got dressed and pulled his shoes on. Old worn out tennis shoes held together by duct tape. He put his glasses on and stood up. His only pair of glasses broke and was held together by tape too.

"Coming, Mrs. Harper!" he yelled back.

'Sherman', (as he had been so dubbed by the wilted piece of paper that had been pinned to the blanket he lay under when he was left in a cardboard box) has bounced around foster homes for as long as he could remember.

The soles of his shoes went _flap flap_ as he walked over to the fading caerulean wall and picked his backpack up. He always keeps his backpack with him since they carry all of his favorite books, mostly containing historical legends.

As he walked down the hallway of the old house he looked through the doors into the other children's rooms and noticed that all of them were empty. Everyone must already be at breakfast.

He sighed as he trudged out the door of the hallway.

" _Always the last one…"_ he thought.

His hand slid along the dark wooden railing as he looked over the balcony to the dining room below.

He could see all his foster siblings were already at the table, eating their breakfast of cereal and toast. It was a school day so of course breakfast was extremely simple.

A middle aged brown-haired woman looked up and saw Sherman standing at the balcony. The few wrinkles starting to form on her face moved as she smiled up at him.

"Well come on Sherman, don't want all the good choices to be gone by the time you get down here."

Sherman continued down the stairs and sat down in one of the wooden chairs, letting his backpack fall to floor to lean beside him against the chair.

"Did you have any dreams about that dog again?" one of the kids asked him.

"No." Sherman merely said as he poured himself some Cheerios.

James. Sherman liked him the most. James was quiet like him and had brown hair and blue eyes was the oldest, nicest, and most mature out of all 5 of them. Sherman supposed it came with his age. He was only 13 but being an orphan along with all the rest of them had caused him to mature much more quickly.

Mrs. Harpers husband Mr. Harper walked into the room.

"Bus will be here soon, better eat quick." He said.

James stuck a piece of toast in his mouth and quickly ran into the kitchen. Sherman wolfed down his cheerios and picked up his backpack.

"Ahahah, Sherman, what do we do after eating?" Mrs. Harper stopped him.

"Bring our dishes to the sink…" Sherman recited. "Sorry Mrs. Harper." He quickly brought his bowl and spoon into the kitchen and dropped them in the sink.

He met James at the front door. As they stood in the entryway by the door watching for the bus, the fraternal twins, Jayce and Jayden, came running up, giggling. They were the eleven-year-old pranksters in the house. As for the fifth, that was little Sophia, she was only 2.

"What's so funny?" James asked them.

"We taped the spray nozzle open, so if someone turns on the water, they'll get sprayed." Jayce said, giggling again as his green eyes twinkled with mischief.

James smiled and shook his head. "But you won't be here to see it, isn't seeing it half the fun?"

"Mr. Harper always does the breakfast dishes, we might hear him before the bus comes." Jayden said, her blond curls bobbing as she moved her head.

Suddenly Mrs. Harper appeared at the entryway. "Bus is here. James, look after them, and have a good day at school. And…" she smiled. "Since it's Friday I'm making pizza."

Sherman smiled, and the twins whooped. Mrs. Harpers homemade pizza was the best.

James smiled and nodded.

"Can I go to the library after school?" Sherman suddenly asked.

Mrs. Harper opened her mouth to answer but before she could, they all heard a noise from the kitchen.

"Agh! Plllbblt!" Came the unmistakable voice of Mr. Harper as he fell for the twins' prank.

Mrs. Harper turned from the kitchen and gave the twins an exasperated look. They simply returned it with looks of innocence.

"Yes, you may." She answered Sherman.

"Now get going before the bus leaves." She said, unable to do anything about the twins' prank.

James opened the front door and they all ran down the stone steps toward the sidewalk where the yellow school bus waited.

Sherman sat next to James on the bus while the twins sat next to their friends. He watched as the bus pulled away from his 'home'. The 'Hard Rock', a nickname they called it because of all the gravel and stone steps in the front. It was one of New York's older buildings, made completely of stone.

School was normal, as it usually was. Until recess.

Sherman took his backpack and went to sit on one of the swings. He pulled out an old, worn, and taped together book. _"A History of The Trojan War"_ it was called. Sherman loved history, it was his favorite subject besides science. He loved reading about wars and conquests and adventures and he relished the fact they were real, because his life was so… boring. Just constantly the same thing over and over again.

He opened it up and began to read. After a few minutes he noticed a 5-year-old kid walking up to him.

"What are you reading?" he asked him.

"I'm reading about the Trojan War." Sherman answered.

"You're doing school during recess?" The kid asked incredulously.

"Yeah…I guess."

"You're weird." the five-year-old stated at him, then wandered away to play again.

Sherman sighed. He couldn't argue with that. He already knew he was weird. He was the weird one in school, he was the weird kid at 'home', and he was even one of the weirdest cases of abandonment in the New York area. Left in a cardboard box outside by an animal shelter. But at least he was found by someone, who made sure he was safe in a hospital, but since then he had bounced from foster home to foster home.

He was given many reasons for moving; behavior issues, special cases, not enough room, but he always felt that it was for one reason: he was weird. Everything about him was weird; his looks, his smile, his love for history. No one wanted him. No one could want him. He had had a couple adoption interviews, but nothing ever came of them.

The Harpers were pretty nice, a bit tired, but their hearts were in the right place. He had lived at the Hard Rock for the past 2 years, it was currently holding the record for the longest time Sherman had stayed at a foster home, and he hoped to keep it that way, at least until he was adopted… if he ever was, that is.

School ended and soon Sherman was on the bus again. It pulled up next to the Hard Rock and all four of them got out.

The twins were chattering to each other and James about their day, so no one was really paying attention to Sherman.

He turned left and started heading east towards the New York Public Library which was only a few blocks away.

However, once he reached the front doors he didn't enter them, instead he continued and entered the alleyway between the library and the building next to it.

He quickly weaved his way around the piles of trash bags and boxes and finally came to the recycling dumpster.

He stacked a few boxes on top of each other next to it and climbed on top of them in order to open the dumpster easier.

As he opened it he smiled. Inside there was a number of books, each in various states of disrepair.

There was a pile of pages with no spine, another with a spine attached to only a few pages, and throughout the inside of the dumpster there was various single pages scattered about.

He happily gathered them all up, being careful not to fold or rip the pages and stuffed them into his backpack.

This was Sherman's favorite thing to do. He couldn't get a library card, and he didn't like going into the library to read, so he would raid the library's recycling dumpster of all the old and damaged books that they had apparently deemed 'unfixable' and salvage them. He would then stay in his room all day taping books together and trying to find the missing pages. If one was incomplete he would throw them out, but when he finished one he would keep them in his bag and read them.

He closed the dumpster lid and jumped down from the boxes. He quickly put his backpack on one shoulder and walked over to the alleyway entrance and looked both ways…

* * *

Peabody took his glasses off and wiped the tears from his eyes. He put them back on his snout as he stood up. He took a deep breath and sighed, trying to calm himself.

Sherman wouldn't want this, he'd want Peabody to fix it. And fix it he would. He promised. He looked ahead into the room where the WABAC should have been. In place of the big red vault door was just a wall. The holographic displays were also missing. The only thing in the room was his lab, filled with all different kinds of chemical test tubes, computers, and other bleeding edge electronic equipment. At least he had a physical place to start.

But he needed to think first. He needed a walk…

As he left the building, the cool air of fall hit his face and ruffled his fur and he closed his eyes as he relished it. He began to walk in no particular direction, however he still knew he was heading in a southeasterly direction because of his internal compass and because he knew New York so well.

As he walked, he began to think. This had to have been caused by someone, somewhere. Time didn't just change randomly. It was like a river, it flowed. And it flowed only in one direction…unless it was diverted. And whenever he and Sherman took the WABAC somewhen, they would divert that flow of time.

Sherman's timeline must have been diverted… by somebody. But the butterfly effect had not affected much. As he looked around, even though he couldn't see anything that had changed, he still felt this uncomfortable feeling of unease, as if he didn't belong here. Obviously the WABAC was gone because Sherman inspired it, but not much else had changed. Peabody also couldn't help but have this sinking feeling that whoever had changed their timeline had villainous intent. For all intents and purposes, he should not remember Sherman according to the laws of time he knew. But he remembered a person he had never adopted and that made him think that time had been specifically manipulated for him to remember Sherman… And while he was grateful for that, he also suspected it was not done out of benevolence.

As he looked about the new New York city, his eye was drawn across the street to the alleyway next to the library. A child of about seven or eight looked like they were sneaking out of it. His heart skipped a beat as he did a double take.

He looked a bit thinner and shorter than his Sherman. His left shoe was wrapped considerably with duct tape, and his glasses were also taped. His backpack looked worn out and was falling apart at the seams and his shirt was washed so much he could almost see the fibers, but he didn't care.

That was his boy, that was Sherman. He was sure of it.

He was sneaking out of the alleyway, his bag stuffed with something heavy. He dashed quickly between the crowds of people and tourist-filled buses, trying to inconspicuously avoid the guards and officers around the library's perimeter. Peabody quickly crossed the street and followed him.

* * *

He got by two blocks before taking a left down a theater-way and jogged until he reached the convenience stores. He breathed heavily as his stomach growled, "Boy, I can't wait til I get back and get some-"

"Sherman!"

He turned around and saw a white dog running on all fours. "Who sa-"

"Sherman!"

It was the dog?

Suddenly his backpack fell from his shoulder onto the ground and all he felt was furry arms wrapping around his torso tightly, so tightly…too tightly…

"Oh Sherman you're alright!" Peabody exclaimed, taking in the familiar smell.

"GUUAUAUAAET OFF! I CAN'T BREAAUGH!" cried Sherman.

Thankfully he let go, and Sherman recovered and was able to look at the dog that had so unceremoniously tackled him in a hug.

"I apologize for my enthusiasm, Sherman." he said, dusting himself off.

The apology did nothing. "I- I don't know you!" Sherman said, slowly backing away. That was only partly true. He did know who this dog was. He was Mr. Peabody, the second greatest inventor, captain of industry, Nobel prize winner and…those were really the only things Sherman could remember that he was, he knew there was more though. Mr. Peabody was well-known in New York as the most intelligent creature on Earth, but no one seemed to mention he was eccentric.

"M-Mrs. Harper says I shouldn't talk to strangers."

The smile on the dog fell. "Sherman? You don't remember me?"

Sherman shook his head vigorously. "Well, I mean I know you're Mr. Peabody, but I don't **know** , know you…"

That settled it. Peabody knew now that time had been specifically manipulated so that he would remember, and Sherman wouldn't, but he still held onto hope that maybe his Sherman was still within this child somewhere…

"You don't remember the WABAC?"

"What are you talking about? The way back to where?"

Peabody sighed. "Sherman, something has gone wrong with the timestream, you don't remember anything, but I do."

Sherman took a moment to process everything the dog had just said. "What do you mean timestream…?" His eyes widened. "Are you a time traveler?"

"Well, yes, we both are."

Between his mind wanting to believe that the laws of physics so far had not proven the existence of time travel, and his heart wanting to know more, Sherman went with the latter, wanting to believe this dog that somehow knew him was telling the truth. Because if he was, that life sounded much better than the one he was currently living.

But first, he needed to know why. "Why me?"

"What do you mean?" Peabody cocked his head.

"How do you know me? Why am I so important to you?" Sherman put a hand to his chest.

Sherman watched as Peabody smiled fondly, and a strange feeling fell over him. No one had ever looked at him like that before. "Because in another time, I was your father."

Of all the answers he expected, that was the last one on his mind, wasn't on his mind at all really. Everything else flew out the window, this dog was weirder than he was.

He ran.

"Sherman, wait!" Peabody called after him, but he didn't listen.

Suddenly he looked down and noticed that Sherman had left his backpack on the ground. He picked it up and unzipped it to look inside.

As he rummaged around inside the bag he saw the usual suspects of a 7-year-old's backpack. Pencils, crayons, schoolbooks, homework papers. But then Peabody saw something else: Both whole and parts of old and worn out historical library books.

Peabody looked at them in wonder. His Sherman loved history too… maybe this new Sherman knew more than he was letting on…

He knew what he had to do now. He had promised his Sherman he would take care of him and take care of him he would. He looked at the strap of the backpack that was falling off, hanging on by only a few threads.

First on the list: He had some shopping to do.


	5. Suspicious Minds

**One day ago…**

" _It worked! It worked! Hahahaha! I can't believe it worked!"_

" _Yes, it worked, but I'm worried about the micro singularity growing, we are using the power of a black hole to make these changes…"_

" _Just make sure the machine keeps it in check, and we'll be fine."_

* * *

 **Present day, October 5, 2013**

As fate would have it, Sherman didn't realize he left his backpack until he was halfway up the stairs to his room. Luckily the next day was Saturday and he wouldn't really need it until Monday. But still, he didn't tell anyone because he knew Mrs. Harper would kill him if she found out. Half of him wondered if Mr. Peabody had noticed it and picked it up and would either try to return it or leave it at the city's lost and found. So, he made a plan that the next day he would run back to the spot he had met Mr. Peabody and check if his backpack was still there, and then check the city's lost and found if it wasn't. So needless to say, Sherman spent most of Friday night in a state of unease. Mrs. Harpers delicious pepperoni pizza didn't help anything. And he was uneasy not only because he lost his backpack, but because of his conversation with Mr. Peabody.

He hadn't said it to Mr. Peabody then, but he also knew him from somewhere else. During the past few days he had begun to have these strange dreams about a white dog. They were vague and just flashes of white, red, and black, but all Sherman knew was that it was a dog, and he felt a strange sense of comfort whenever he would have these dreams. That's another reason why he had freaked out. He had wondered if Mr. Peabody was the personification, or rather, dogification of his dreams.

He couldn't stop thinking about it. Mr. Peabody had claimed that, in some other life, Sherman was his son. While the concept was completely weird to him, he couldn't help but keep thinking about it. He had been wanting to be adopted ever since he was old enough to know what adoption was. To love somebody… and be loved by somebody… He wanted that. He wondered if his dreams and the fact Mr. Peabody claimed they were time travelers were connected.

He had just woken up and was getting dressed on Saturday when Mrs. Harper called him from downstairs.

"Sherman! Can you please come down to the kitchen?!"

He quickly finished dressing himself and ran down the stairs as fast as he could.

"I'm coming, Mrs. Harper!" Sherman yelled, stomping his feet down the wooden stairs. It was weird, hearing his name being bellowed from the kitchen.

" _Usually I'm the last one at breakfast. Oh well."_ he thought as he turned the corner, _"First time for every-"_

"Hello, Sherman." Came a voice from the back door.

* * *

After the encounter with Sherman, Peabody went to the store and purchased a brand spanking new top of the line backpack. Then he went home and selected a few of his own history books from his massive bookshelf and placed them inside the new backpack, along with all the contents of Sherman's old one.

Then he had used his resources to find out where Sherman was staying. He was finally able to narrow it down to a foster home that was only a few blocks away.

The penthouse felt incredibly lonely and quiet as he went to sleep that night, and he couldn't help but feel a twinge of sadness as he crawled into his bed. Was this what it would have been like if he had never adopted Sherman? He didn't like it. Before he adopted Sherman he had of course spent many nights alone in the penthouse, but he didn't have Sherman then. As the saying goes, 'You don't know what you have until you've lost it.' As he fell asleep he wondered what kind of dog he would have become if Sherman hadn't entered his life when he did…

The next day he got up, had breakfast alone, and then took Sherman's new backpack down the elevator.

Luckily for him, today was Saturday and the building was closed; so his receptionist wasn't there to question why he was taking a child's backpack somewhere.

He walked down the street towards the foster home, ignoring any looks passersby gave him. As he approached it, he noticed the decrepit gray stone building.

It was sitting in between two more modern buildings and Peabody wondered why it was still here. He quickly looked it over and discovered a small yard in the back with a swing set and a back door. He walked up the stone steps and knocked on it. After a few moments of waiting, holding the backpack with both paws in front of him, the door was answered.

It opened and a woman with a weathered face looked out for a second before looking down and noticing him.

She shrieked slightly and put a hand to her mouth before speaking.

"Mr. Peabody! I-I'm so sorry!" she said, holding a hand out towards him. "I didn't expect to see you here!"

"It is perfectly alright. I expected as much, Ms….?"

She recovered. "Mrs. Harper. My husband is currently in the living room. Why don't you come in?" she moved aside so he could do so.

"Thank you, Mrs. Harper. So, I take it you have heard of me then?" Peabody asked as he walked into the kitchen. It was a quaint little kitchen, plants sitting inside the bay window over the sink, wooden cupboards on either side, and yellow wallpaper covering the walls. There was an adolescent boy sitting at the countertop table who looked up as Peabody walked in but said nothing.

Mrs. Harper went back over to the stove where she had been cooking. "Of course, you are the dog genius that graduated from Harvard, valedictorian, you're a Nobel prize winner, Olympic medalist, captain of industry, second greatest inventor…" she chuckled. "I'm sure there's more but I'm forgetting what. My husband and I are both rather impressed with what you've accomplished, what with being a…dog and all…"

Her voice was drowned out as Peabody's mind raised a red flag. He was the first greatest inventor; the public, (at least in the previous timeline) had even said so. Why would Mrs. Harper think otherwise? He suspected this was another timeline change, but he wanted to know more.

He was distracted from his thoughts because Mrs. Harper had taken his silence as offense and sucked in air through her teeth.

"I'm sorry, did that offend you?"

"No, of course not, it is what I am, after all." Peabody said graciously. "But what did you mean 'second greatest inventor'?"

She looked relieved but then turned surprised.

"I-I'm sure you know… Richmond Wolf created the invention that has saved millions of dollars in fossil fuel usage. I can't remember what it's called, but it has made the public call him the greatest inventor, and you're known as the second…"

Peabody's mind raised the biggest red flag ruckus since the whole timeline change. He knew Richmond Wolf. They were bitter rivals in college and throughout most of the first couple of years of their careers. But in the previous timeline **he** had been the one that created that invention, not Richmond. He had more to think about, but he filed it away for now.

In order to save face and not dig himself into a further hole Peabody went along with it.

"Oh yes. My apologies, I forget occasionally." He chuckled nervously. "I… will admit I have a bit of an ego."

Mrs. Harper didn't say anything to that and looked at him with a smile and a raised eyebrow. "So, what in the world is the great Mr. Peabody doing here at our humble foster home?" she asked.

Peabody focused on the backpack he was holding. "Ah yes, the reason for my visit. I quite literally ran into one of your foster children at the library yesterday. And after apologizing for it Sherman was rather discombobulated and ran off, leaving his backpack behind, and I am simply returning it."

"Oh! Well thank you so much for doing that. Let me call him so he can thank you himself." Mrs. Harper said as she went over to the stairway right next to the door into the kitchen and called out.

"Sherman! Can you please come down to the kitchen?!"

Peabody heard Sherman answer. "I'm coming, Mrs. Harper!" And then a loud stomping down the stairs.

Sherman turned the corner and Peabody smiled as he saw him.

"Hello, Sherman." He said.

The seven-year-old's eyes widened. "THAT'S the…YOU'RE…"

"This is Mr. Peabody, Sherman." Mrs. Harper explained, "He said he accidentally bumped into you at the library and you dropped your backpack. He wanted to return it." she extended her hand to the standing dog holding the bag.

Sherman blushed, "uh…heh…yeah…I sure did alright." he shrugged. He took a good look; it wasn't the bag he had before. That one was rotten and stitched messily together. This one was clean and unpatched, completely new and from the looks of it, top of the line. Sherman grabbed the bag held out to him.

"What do y-"

"Th-thank you…Mr. Peabody...for finding my bag." he finished, amazed. A new bag. he couldn't believe it.

Peabody just smiled, "It was no trouble, Sherman. No trouble at all." The double meaning didn't slip by the boy and he smiled and nodded back.

"Well Mr. Peabody, would you like anything to drink? I can make you a nice earl grey tea." Mrs. Harper said as Sherman took the backpack and began to head back up the stairs.

"No thank you, I actually must be going." He said.

"Then thank you again for returning Sherman's backpack, I'll have to give him a talking to for leaving it." She said.

"With all due respect, I don't think this deserves a punishment, it was completely my fault, and Sherman was flustered, if not a little nervous to be talking to a dog for the first time in his life." Peabody said, unable to hold back his 7 ½ year old parental instinct.

"With all due respect to you as well, Mr. Peabody, but what experience do you have raising a child?" Mrs. Harper asked seriously.

And with that, the tension between them suddenly became palpable.

For the first time since the timeline had changed, Peabody felt a new emotion. Frustration almost to the point of anger.

Frustration because the new timeline had already caused him enough headaches, not to mention heartaches, and his ability as a parent was now in question. He completely understood why, but it was still frustrating, because he couldn't just tell her that he was a parent to Sherman in another timeline, that would shatter her current impression of him and cause lots of questions. He also suspected he was going to be in this timeline awhile, and if he wanted to keep seeing Sherman while he was in it, he needed to stay on the Harpers good side as much as possible.

He bowed slightly. "My apologies, I was not trying to tell you how to run your foster home, simply my interpretation of events."

Mrs. Harper softened. "It is alright, I wasn't intending to punish him anyways, that sort of thing doesn't require a punishment, just a reminder."

He nodded. "Well thank you for your time Mrs. Harper."

They finally said their goodbyes and Peabody left, but not before Mrs. Harper realized something.

She ran out the door, peeked out into the alley and called out.

"Wait! Mr. Peabody! How did you know Sherman's name?"

Peabody turned around and looked at her. "I asked him his name." He said, and then turned and continued walking towards the street.

Mrs. Harper slowly walked back into the house, contemplating the whole conversation she had just had with Mr. Peabody.

She was pretty sure Sherman would never say his name to a complete stranger… She definitely had to give him a talking to… And she had a strange feeling Mr. Peabody wasn't being completely forthcoming about his encounter with Sherman…

* * *

Sherman lugged the backpack all the way to the top of stairs, but the backpack was heavier than he remembered it.

"Ugh," he groaned, "Why is it so heavy? What did he put in here?!"

Having had enough, Sherman dropped the bag and opened it up. "Oh…Oh my gosh!" he exclaimed.

Inside, along with all his old backpack's previous contents, there was an array of new books. History books, one on Napoleon, another about Leonardo Da Vinci, and a couple others. Peabody had filled Sherman's bag with new books.

Sherman stared at them in confusion. First the backpack, and now all the books. Why was Mr. Peabody doing this?

Now he really wanted to know more about this time continuum incident thingy and previous childhood he had.

He zipped up the backpack and put it on his back and ran downstairs again and into the kitchen.

He hoped to catch Mr. Peabody before he was completely gone, but Mrs. Harper stopped him.

"Whoa, whoa where are you going young man?" She said from her seat at the kitchen table as he skidded to a stop.

"Out." Sherman said.

"Out where?"

"I dunno."

"Well before you go, I need to remind you, it's important that you not lose your backpack, because we can't afford to get you another one."

"Yes, Mrs. Harper." Sherman intoned.

"Why didn't you tell us you lost it yesterday?" she asked.

"B-because I was afraid you would be mad…" Sherman finished in a whisper. "I was gonna look for it today, honest!"

"Well, just be more careful Sherman." She said. "As for meeting Mr. Peabody, what exactly happened?"

Having made up his mind he wanted to find out more about Mr. Peabody, the timeline continuum issue, and this previous childhood he had, and also having overheard their whole conversation from the stairs, Sherman had to make a rapid decision.

Mr. Peabody had lied about their encounter. Sherman couldn't answer as to why, but he knew that if he wanted things to go well, he would have to match Mr. Peabody's story, truth or not.

"He wasn't watching where he was walking and ran into me… we fell down and he said sorry and asked me what my name was, I ran away because I was scared."

Suddenly, Jayce and Jayden came running into the kitchen, yelling and screaming, Jayden was apparently chasing Jayce.

"Jayce! Jayden! What have I told you about running through the house!" Mrs. Harper scolded them.

"But Jayce took my hair bow!" Jayden whined.

Sherman fidgeted, Mr. Peabody was getting further away every second.

"Jayce, give her back her hair bow." Mrs. Harper glared at him.

Jayce produced said hair bow and gave it back to his sister.

Mrs. Harper looked at Sherman. "Ok. You may go, but as usual, no further than the library."

He ran outside and down the alley to the street. He frantically looked both ways for a small white dog among the pedestrians.

He finally found him in the distance walking on the sidewalk and took off after him.


	6. Lunch with the doG in the Sky

Peabody's mind raced. He had a very high suspicion he knew who had caused the timeline change now. Richmond Wolf.

His feelings for Richmond before the timeline change were pretty much nonexistent. He hadn't talked to the man in a couple months. The last time he saw him was at a technology expo in August, but then nothing.

If Richmond was indeed the culprit, then he couldn't understand why Richmond would manipulate the timeline so that he never adopted Sherman. Why would he have a grudge against him? Regardless of why, Peabody was slowly becoming more and more angry at him, he didn't notice that, as he was walking, his paws were balled into fists, and his tail rapidly swished horizontally back and forth.

But he relaxed when he heard it.

"Hey! M-Mr. Peabody!?"

His paws relaxed and his tail stopped its angry movement at the sound of his sons voice. He turned around, smiling.

"Yes, Sherman?" he asked as Sherman ran up, panting.

"C…could you tell me more? W…why did you get me new books and a backpack?"

"Because you're my son, and I promised you that I would take care of you." Peabody said, smiling affectionately at him. "I despise that you're stuck in a foster home, and I am aware that you have absolutely no memory of me-"

"Actually, I do."

Peabody stopped as his smile fell slightly. "W-what are you talking about?"

"Well, I mean it's not really a memory, more like dreams."

"What do you mean?" Peabody asked, green eyes watching him intently.

"I've been having… dreams… about you, I think…" Sherman said, scrunching up his face as he thought. "They aren't very clear, and I can only see you, just… talking to me, really."

Peabody suddenly had a thought. He grabbed Sherman by the shoulders. "When did these dreams start?"

"I dunno, maybe two or three days ago…"

That was it. Peabody was more certain now what happened. He let go of Sherman's shoulders.

"Yes, that's it…the timeline change happened around the same time…" he said, more to himself than anything as he began to slowly pace in the middle of the sidewalk, a paw under his chin.

Sherman watched him, thankful there weren't any other pedestrians nearby.

"We've got to find out what went wrong with the space time continuum…and think I know who the culprit is…"

"Uh-huh."

"I need to head to the house and chart a few ideas-" Peabody said, suddenly starting to continue walking.

"Can I come?" Sherman asked, falling into step beside him.

Peabody turned and looked at him. "Wouldn't your foster parents be worried?"

"Nah, they've got their hands full with the other kids… 'cept James though…"

"Who is James?" Peabody asked.

"He's my older foster brother, he's 13 and can take care of himself."

"Ah. Well, alright then." Peabody agreed.

The walk back to the penthouse was pleasant. Peabody noticed that Sherman, even though he didn't have his memories, he still had almost the same personality as his Sherman. He was a fountain of questions as they walked.

"What is a WABAC? What does it look like? How does it travel through time? Did we really visit historical people? Who did we visit?"

Peabody patiently and happily answered them, just glad for their relationship to reach a brief sense of familiarity.

They entered through the large revolving glass doors into the lobby of Peabody Industries. Sherman looked up at the vaulted ceiling, admiring the pretty round light chandelier, mouth open in wonder. Peabody smiled at him.

"Are you hungry, Sherman?" he asked.

Sherman looked back down at him. "I…am... starving… I haven't had breakfast yet."

"Well then, let's go up to the penthouse and I will see what I can whip up, shall we?"

Sherman followed Mr. Peabody into one of the elevators and they rode it all the way up.

The doors opened, and Sherman again opened his mouth in wonder as he slowly walked out.

"You can explore if you want while I see what I can come up with for lunch, Sherman." Peabody said as he walked past him and turned into the dining room and walked through it and pushed the swinging door open into the kitchen.

"Ok…" Sherman said, still fascinated with the penthouse. Clean white walls everywhere, shiny wood floors, he had never seen such… _cleanliness_ before. He looked over the railing to the right and saw the giant pool down below.

He continued walking into the living room and saw the floor to ceiling windows, the conversation pit, and the massive bookshelf and grand piano at the other end.

He slowly walked into the kitchen and saw Mr. Peabody rummaging through a bin of vegetables in the refrigerator.

"I used to live here?" he asked incredulously.

Peabody lifted his head from the bin and laughed. "Of course you did. I know it's vastly different experience from your foster home. Why don't you sit down and tell me about it. What is it like?"

He pointed at a chair that was sitting in front of the large island counter, half of it was a stove and the other half was a countertop.

Sherman walked forward and let his backpack slide to the floor and sat down in the indicated chair.

"Well," he began, as Peabody began to chop up the vegetable he had selected, a head of iceberg lettuce. "Mr. and Mrs. Harper are my foster parents, and I have 4 foster siblings, James, Jayce, Jayden, and Sophia."

"And what are they like?" Peabody asked as he briefly glanced at him before focusing on his rapid chopping again.

"Well Mr. Harper I don't see much, he's always working on fixing the building because it's so old, and he's always worried about money, because the government isn't supplying enough to help take care of us or something, I think. Mrs. Harper mostly takes care of all of us. She's stern, but nice. James is 13, but he's really mature and nice, and he usually watches out for all of us when the Harpers aren't around. Jayce and Jayden are the fraternal twins, they love to joke a lot and tease us and each other. And Sophia is just the baby. Why are you asking me this?" he asked.

"No reason, I was just curious." Peabody said as he threw the lettuce into bowl and began to throw croutons, other vegetables, and a dressing into it and stirring it around, making a salad.

"What is your home life like?" he then went over to the cupboard and pulled out a bag of bread buns.

"Well we all go to school, and then when I'm home I put together books."

"You mean the books you've gotten from the library dumpster?" he asked as he finished covering the buns in a garlic butter mixture that made Sherman's mouth water and lined them up on a pan and put them in the oven.

"Yeah."

"Well that's very good of you, reduce, reuse, and recycle I always say. What else do you do?" he asked as he walked over to the large refrigerator and withdrew a package of chicken drumsticks.

"Nothing." Sherman said flatly.

"Nothing? Do you not have any toys you play with? Games you play?" Peabody frowned as he opened the package and began to roll the drumsticks in a premixed seasoning that was sitting in a bowl nearby.

"Well we have toys, but they're all boring now, and they usually break because of the twins. We do have a rickety swing set in the back though."

"Do you not go anywhere, do fun activities? Like go to the park or to the beach?" Peabody lined the drumsticks up on another baking sheet and inserted them into the oven.

"We can't. We only have one car with 5 seats, and there's 7 of us, so we can never go anywhere all together." Sherman looked around. "Where's my room?"

"It does not exist." Peabody said.

"Why? I thought you said I used to live here with you…" Sherman frowned.

"You did, but due to the butterfly effect, anything that is even remotely related to you is gone. Come with me."

Peabody jumped down from the raised platform and Sherman followed him out the door of the kitchen and into the hallway that led to their rooms.

"There used to be pictures on this wall," Peabody said as he gestured with a paw towards the memory wall, which now held a various assortment of his awards. "Pictures of us, when you were young."

He smiled a little as he remembered.

Soon they reach the door that was Sherman's room. Peabody opened it and Sherman didn't see anything other than a bunch of gym equipment.

"This was your room." Peabody said. "It is not anymore because I never adopted you."

"Why?" Sherman asked.

"It is simple cause and effect. If I never adopted you, why would I have a room for you?"

"Oh." Sherman said. "Then why do you remember me at all?"

Peabody smiled and pointed at him. "And that, my dear boy, is the question of the day."

Sherman smiled back. No one had ever called him that ever. He liked the sound of it.

Peabody began to walk back towards the kitchen. "I don't know why I do, yet. But I thank my lucky stars that I do at all, otherwise I wouldn't even know I had adopted you in another life."

Soon, the lunch Peabody had prepared was ready and they both sat at the table to eat it. Sherman wolfed down everything. It was a feast compared to the food he normally got at Hard Rock.

"I-I should go back home… Don't want anyone worrying about me." Sherman said after they finished. "Thanks for lunch Mr. Peabody." Truthfully, he wanted to stay and learn more about this previous life he had, but he didn't want anyone questioning where he had gone if he was out for an extended amount of time.

"You're welcome, Sherman." Peabody smiled at him.

Peabody walked back to Hard Rock with Sherman and then they said goodbye.

Sherman walked inside the house and the first thing he noticed was that it was quiet. Given the houses inhabitants, that was a miracle.

"Hello!?" He called out.

"Hi Sherman." James said as he emerged from the kitchen. "The Harpers went out."

"Where'd they go?"

"I don't know, they just said that 'something important came up' and they had to go take care of it."

"Oh. Where is everybody else?" Sherman asked.

"Sophia's taking a nap, so be quiet if you go up to your room, and the twins are outside on the swing set."

"Ok." Sherman said. He quietly walked upstairs and went into his room and spent the next half hour finally repairing the books he had gotten from the library's dumpster.

Soon James joined him.

"What are you doing?" he asked. Sherman was sprawled out on his bedroom floor, pages and book spines spread out, a large roll of clear tape next to him.

"Putting these books back together." Sherman said. He was holding a stack of pages and was looking through the rest of the spread-out pages when he suddenly gasped excitedly.

"There it is!" he said as he grabbed another stack of pages and began to attach them together with tape.

James sat down and leaned against the wall and pulled out a notebook.

"What are **you** doing?" Sherman asked him.

"Homework."

"Why are you doing it in here?"

"Because the Harpers aren't back yet. And I'm bored, so I'll watch you." He grinned.

For a while there was silence. The only sound was James' pencil scribbling. Then he spoke.

"So, where'd you go today? The library?" he asked.

"No…." Sherman said, not sure if he should tell James.

"Then where?" he asked.

"If I tell you, do you promise not to tell the Harpers?" Sherman looked at him pleadingly.

"I promise." James said. "Is this about you running into Mr. Peabody yesterday?"

"Yes…" Sherman said. James looked at him and said nothing, expecting him to continue.

"So… Mr. Peabody didn't actually run into me…"

"I didn't think so…" James smirked.

"I was coming home from the library and he came running up behind me and hugged me!"

James laughed with his eyebrows creased in confusion. "Really?"

"Yes! And then he says that I used to be his son and something happened to this time thingy."

"His son?" James asked.

"He adopted me in some other time. And I ran away because it was all so weird, and that's why I forgot my backpack; it fell off when he hugged me. But then he returned it this morning with this completely new one," he lifted it up as he spoke. "along with new books. So, I went after him and asked him more about what happened, and we went to his house and had lunch. Then I came back here."

James said nothing for a moment before blinking. "Wow."

"His house is so cool! He's got a giant pool and everything!" Sherman exclaimed.

James scoffed. "Well yeah, he's a multi billionaire, he can afford whatever the heck he wants. Lucky you."

"Those dreams I've been having were about him…" Sherman said quietly.

James' eyes widened. "Really?"

"Yeah, at least I think so…"

"So… what does he want to do? Does he want to adopt you again?" James asked.

"I dunno…"

"…do you want him to?"

"I dunno! It's weird! He's a dog!"

"Yeah, but he was already weird when we first heard about him, now it's normal. And aside from his physical appearance, he has passed every single human test that's been thrown at him. He is basically a human in a dog's body, and yes that's weird, but he's literally the only dog that speaks more human languages than anyone else on the planet, is self-aware, and has emotions; all qualities of humans, not… animals." James said.

Sherman was conflicted. He wanted to be adopted someday. He had dreamed about finally finding some adoptive parents who loved him, and that he had grown to love, and then live with them, and finally live a normal life. But now that he had seen a glimpse of what he could have had, or had had apparently, he wasn't sure if he wanted that anymore.

"But I want to be adopted by normal parents, don't you?"

James sighed. "Sherman, you know how hard it is for teenagers to get adopted… They're always passed over for the younger, cuter ones…" he said as he absently doodled on his notepad, growing slightly angrier every stroke.

"They just assume that any teenager is going to be this moody, depressed person, and they don't want that… but they never stop to consider… that maybe not all teenagers are like that!"

His pencil tip broke and he angrily threw it at the wall across the room.

He sighed again. "I've resigned myself to the fact that I will probably be here until I am 18, when I can finally get out of this place and get a job…"

"Oh." Sherman pulled out another piece of tape and taped some more pages together.

Suddenly Sophia began to cry, waking from her nap.

James grumbled. "This is all I will be until I'm 18, the babysitter." He stood up.

"Look, if I were you, I wouldn't care what the person who wants to adopt me looks like, if I developed a good relationship with them, and they wanted to adopt me, I'd go the frick for it." He said.

Sherman gasped. "Mrs. Harper said no swearing!"

"She's not here!" James said as he walked out the room to go take care of Sophia.

Soon, the Harpers returned, and the atmosphere in the house returned to normal. Dinner was made, and Sherman, much to his relief, wasn't questioned about Mr. Peabody.

He went to bed that night hoping he would get a chance to see Mr. Peabody again and find out more about this previous childhood he had.

* * *

His assistant came rushing in, holding a newspaper. "Rich, he found him."

"What?!" he exclaimed.

His assistant threw the newspaper down. "The machine put the child in a foster home only a few blocks from his penthouse, and he found the child just yesterday."

He looked at the newspaper. On the front page was a picture that was clearly taken by some average Joe off the street with a smartphone. In it he could see the front of Peabody Industries, with Peabody and who was unmistakably Sherman entering the building.

"Genius Dog Seen with Local Orphan. What could it mean?" the headline read.

He scanned the article and discovered it wasn't very long, the reporter didn't have much to go on, but they were going to ask Mr. Peabody for any comment the next day.

"It doesn't matter. The boy is no longer his son. And he doesn't even remember him. Still, I'm curious as to how this has affected him…maybe I can even have some fun and toy with them…"


	7. Enter Papa Wolf

_Peabody entered 4-year-old Sherman's room._

 _"Sherman, time for bed." He said in a sing song voice._

 _Sherman turned around briefly and then went back to playing with his dinosaurs. "No."_

 _Peabody was surprised. Normally his son wasn't so rebellious._

 _"Sherman..." Peabody said in a low voice as he approached his son from behind. "You need to get your sleep, otherwise you will be bad-tempered in the morning."_

 _Sherman said nothing and continued playing with his dinosaurs._

 _That was it, time to bring in the physical force._

 _Peabody leaned down and pushed Sherman's back with his nose, causing Sherman to arch his back from the slightly rough texture. He fell forward, catching himself with his arms, giggling slightly._

 _"Come...on...Sherman...or...do...I...have...to...get...physical...with...you?" Peabody chuckled, each word punctuated by a slight push and rub with his nose to Sherman's back._

 _"Ok ok, Miser Peabody, I'm going." Sherman said laughing. He began to crawl towards his bed extremely slowly._

 _Peabody dropped to all fours and moved to Sherman's side and started pushing and nuzzling it. Sherman, being very ticklish there started laughing and trying to push his father's nose away._

 _"That's too slow Sherman...I need...you...to...move...faster." Peabody said._

 _Sherman started crawling toward his bed and up onto it, laughing with Peabody pushing and nuzzling him the whole way, all the way under his covers._

 _"Good boy Sherman, goodnight." Peabody said smiling at him and tucking him in, picking up the toys and putting them away as he left._

" _Gnight Miser Peabody." Sherman said._

* * *

 **Present day, October 6, 2013**

Peabody smiled to himself at the memory. He continued folding the boy's clothes he had procured. Some new shirts and pairs of pants and shoes. He then placed the brand-new pair of round black glasses on top of the clothes and placed them all in a satchel which he threw over his shoulder.

He was going to visit Sherman again today, and then he would begin work on finding out what happened to the timeline.

He left the building with a spring in his step. He felt confident. He could fix the timeline mess-up. All it would take is creating another WABAC and then going back in time.

As he neared the foster home, he suddenly heard noises. People talking. And they were coming from the alley next to it.

He rounded the corner and his eyes met a sight that made his blood boil.

There were two older boys standing next to the stone wall of the building, and they were leaning over Sherman, who was backed up against it.

"You steal from our library again, and we'll do worse than this." One of them said as he pointed to the ground, where Sherman's new backpack was lying. It looked like it had been thrown, and the contents were strewn out everywhere and looked like they had been trampled on. Sherman's recycled library books he had painstakingly put back together were ripped up, bits of pages spread out over the ground.

Sherman himself was crying, tears streaming down his face. "B-but they were in the garbage recycling!"

"We own that library, and no one takes anything from it without our say so!" The other said.

Peabody dropped the bag he was holding. He was livid. That was his child, timeline change or not. No one messed with his child. His jowls raised, and he started growling. Instinct was in control of his faculties now.

"HEY!"

They all looked at the source of the noise. Sherman gasped. It had come from Mr. Peabody, but he couldn't tell if that sound he had just made was him yelling 'Hey!', or the bark of a very… very angry dog…

Peabody's eyes were shooting fire, and his tail was swinging back and forth angrily, his paws balled up. He furiously stomped up to the two bullies, who were looking at him in fear, even though they had quite the height advantage.

"That is my son! And I will not have your petty shenanigans hinder his aspirations!" Peabody growled and snapped, spittle flying out of his mouth.

The two boys didn't know what to make of an angry growling dog yelling at them and were quite frightened and ran off down the alley without another word.

Sherman stared at Mr. Peabody in mixed fear and shock.

Peabody looked down the alley where the boys had disappeared to for a few more moments, calming himself, before he looked at Sherman.

"Are you alright Sherman?" he asked. "I'm sorry, that was quite uncharacteristic of me…"

"Y-yeah…" Sherman sniffed and wiped his face, still staring at Peabody like he was a stick of dynamite that might explode again at any second.

Peabody leaned down and began to pick up the scattered books.

"I'm sorry about your books Sherman." He put them all back inside the backpack and handed it back to Sherman, who took it slowly, eyes never leaving Peabody's face.

"What happened?" he asked.

Sherman realized he had been asked a question. "I was throwing the garbage bag into the dumpster when they came up and pulled my backpack off me and threw it on the ground and said I shouldn't take from the library dumpster anymore…" he looked on the verge of crying again.

"I see." Peabody walked back over to where he had dropped his bag of clothes and picked it up and brought it back over to where Sherman was still standing.

"Maybe this will help cheer you up, I got you some new clothes." He smiled as he handed the bag to Sherman who took it and opened it up.

Peabody expected him to be happy, but suddenly Sherman started whimpering, and then began to sob quietly.

He didn't understand. "Sherman?" he asked, alarmed. "What's wrong?"

"N-nothing, Mr. Peabody." he hiccuped. "Thank you…"

Sherman pulled out the pristine round black glasses and pulled his scratched, taped together ones off and put the new ones on.

He smiled, a couple more tears streaming down his face.

Then he quickly rushed forward and hugged Peabody. Peabody was surprised but hugged him back. He suddenly realized that he hadn't physically touched Sherman since he had first seen him in the changed timeline and that he had missed it desperately. He hugged tighter. No words were exchanged between the two, but none were needed.

They pulled apart. "I think it would be best if you change into the clothes inside the house, Sherman." Peabody said.

Sherman giggled. "Yeah."

Peabody smiled. "Anyways, I must be going, I just wanted to drop those off."

"No, can't you come inside? I want you to meet everyone." Sherman asked eagerly, grabbing his paw.

"I suppose I can for a few minutes." He yielded.

Peabody picked up the clothes satchel and Sherman picked up his backpack and they both walked over to the back door.

"Mr. Peabody's here!" Sherman announced happily as they walked in.

Almost the whole house was already gathered inside the kitchen, Mrs. Harper stood at the stove, cooking something for lunch, and the twins and James were sitting at the small counter adjacent to the stove, watching her.

Mr. Harper was sitting in a lone chair, feeding Sophia, who was sitting in a high chair facing him.

"Oh! Welcome Mr. Peabody." Mrs. Harper said.

Jayce and Jayden looked at him confused. "Who's that?" Jayce asked.

"It's Mr. Peabody, you know? The dog who won a Nobel Prize?" James said, exasperated.

Mr. Harper stopped feeding Sophia and stood up, but then knelt down again as he shook Mr. Peabody's paw.

"Good to meet you Mr. Peabody." He said, smiling. "I hear you've already met Sherman and my wife."

Peabody smiled cordially back. "Yes, I have."

"Well thank you from me as well for returning Sherman's backpack." He said. "Money's tight, so we can't afford to get him another one."

"Doesn't the foster care agency provide a monthly stipend?" Peabody asked.

"Well yes, they do, but it's not enough, I'm able to get part time jobs as a regular handyman/fixer upper, or whatever you want to call it, but we're slipping." He said.

"However," Mrs. Harper interrupted. "I am curious about what the front page in today's newspaper is about…"

She left the stove and produced a folded Sunday newspaper from her pocket and showed it to Mr. Peabody.

He slid the satchel behind his back and took the newspaper in both paws, staring at it.

On the front page there was a picture that was clearly taken by some average Joe off the street with a smartphone. In it he could see the front of Peabody Industries, with himself and Sherman entering the building.

" _Genius Dog Seen with local orphan. What could it mean?_ " the headline read.

Peabody handed the newspaper back without reading the article. There was proof, right there. They were caught.

"Oh yes, Sherman came to my house for lunch yesterday." He smiled.

"Why?" Mrs. Harper asked.

"Because I asked if I could." Sherman blurted out.

"Sherman!" she scolded. "That's a very impertinent thing to do! Mr. Peabody's probably very busy."

Peabody smiled nervously. "I'm actually not."

"I find that hard to believe." Mrs. Harper said with her arms folded. "What I also find hard to believe is why you have suddenly caught each other's interest."

"What do you mean?" Peabody asked.

"I took a good look at Sherman's backpack and I realized its not his normal backpack. It's completely new, and you were the one who returned Sherman's backpack."

Mr. Harper suddenly noticed Sherman's new glasses. "Did you get him those new glasses too?" he asked Peabody.

Peabody sighed. "Yes, I bought them for him." he said.

"-and apparently you got him new glasses too. What is going on Mr. Peabody? Why are you showing Sherman such kindness?" Mrs. Harper asked, staring at him.

Peabody was silent. He didn't know what to say.

"Because he loves Sherman." James said suddenly.

They all looked at him. "How do you know?" Mrs. Harper asked him.

James scoffed. "It's so obvious, I saw the look on his face when he looked at Sherman when he 'returned the backpack' yesterday." He air quoted.

Mrs. Harper turned back to Peabody. "Is that true?"

"Yes." Peabody said simply. He couldn't deny it.

"Again, why? We just want to know the truth." She asked.

Peabody stuttered.

It was becoming harder and harder to hide it, he might as well tell them everything.

So he did. Beginning with the fact he was a time traveler and had adopted Sherman in a previous timeline and ending where he had been thrust into this new timeline where he never adopted Sherman.

He finished and there was silence for a few moments until Jayden yelled out. "That's so cool! Have you been to the future?"

"Once, but we normally go to the past." Peabody said.

Mr. Harper shook his head. "Hang on, let me get this straight. In this…other time…line, you adopted Sherman when he was only a baby, invented your time machine, the…WABAC, nice pun by the way,"

"Thank you." Peabody smirked.

"and for 7 ½ years, you traveled through time with Sherman, until one day you woke up and he was just…gone?"

"Precisely." Peabody said.

Mrs. Harper looked at him suspiciously. "But yet you can't prove any of this, because you don't have the WABAC anymore?"

"No, I do not." Peabody said. "I realize there is nothing I can do to prove what I have said, but I assure you, everything I have said is true."

"Mr. Peabody, you realize our job is ensuring the welfare of our foster children, and this all seems very suspicious… I realize you may want to adopt Sherman and I do not really see any problem with it…" Mrs. Harper said.

Sherman stood there watching the 'adults' converse. From his limited knowledge of how the foster care system worked, he still knew that he should at least have a say since he was the child in question.

"What about me?" he asked.

"What about you?" Mrs. Harper said.

"What if I want to be with Mr. Peabody? I trust him."

Peabody began to wonder something, something that made his skin crawl. He wondered if this Sherman was operating under the assumption that Peabody would simply adopt him. If that was the case he was becoming too attached, too involved. Both of them were. He knew that when all was said and done, he would have his Sherman back, and this Sherman would only be a distant memory. But, he didn't know if and when he would tell this Sherman that, and how he would take it.

He needed to leave, this was a waste of time.

"Maybe I should just take my leave and let you decide what's best for Sherman." He smiled anxiously. "I need to go determine what happened to the time continuum."

"I want to go with him." Sherman said. "Can I?" he asked Peabody.

Despite his mind saying no, his heart still controlled his mouth. "Yes, of course Sherman, if your foster parents will allow you."

Sherman looked at Mrs. Harper expectantly. "I still find this highly unusual." Mrs. Harper said. "But yes, you may go Sherman."

"Can we come too?" the twins asked.

"No, Mr. Peabody doesn't need multiple children to look after." Mrs. Harper said as she rolled her eyes to look at them.

Peabody and Sherman walked to the back door, said goodbye after Peabody assured Mrs. Harper Sherman would be back before dinner, and left.

"I believe him." Mr. Harper said.

Mrs. Harper looked at her husband in surprise. "You do?"

"Yes, I mean why would lie? How does this whole story benefit him? Why would he just start doing this out of the blue unless something happened that only he knows about?"

Her husband had a point, but Mrs. Harper still wasn't convinced. "I don't know…it's all just so… weird."


	8. Forward to Time Past

The walk to the penthouse was quiet. Peabody was quiet, thinking. Because he was quiet and thinking he failed to notice Sherman was abnormally quiet too.

They passed 55th avenue and Sherman spotted someone sitting on a bench wearing a black trench coat and hat who was looking right at them. Sherman couldn't see their face very well since they had folded their collar up to shield it from the cool fall winds. They quickly looked away when Sherman noticed them.

Sherman thought nothing of it, but then out of random chance he turned to look behind them and saw the same person walking about 50 feet behind.

Sherman looked forward again and bit his lip. They finally came to the front door of Peabody Industries and Sherman looked behind them again. The person was standing across the street among a crowd of people waiting to cross at a crosswalk.

"Mr. Peabody?" Sherman whispered.

"Yes, Sherman?" Peabody asked as he pushed through the revolving door.

"I think we were followed." He whispered.

"Followed? By who?" Peabody asked in alarm.

"That person right…there." Sherman pointed, but the crowd of people had already crossed the crosswalk and their stalker was nowhere to be seen.

"He's gone."

"I'm sure you just imagined it, Sherman. New York is a big city, and people travel the same directions all the time."

Sherman shrugged and didn't give it any more thought. He was too excited to see Mr. Peabody's house again.

They entered the elevator, but this time Mr. Peabody pushed the button below the penthouses button and entered the access code.

"Where does that button go?" Sherman asked.

Peabody smiled. "You'll see."

The doors opened, and Sherman felt like he had stepped into the future. The architecture was completely different to the penthouse above. The colors were blue and silver and the textures were shiny metal and floor was a deep black.

Peabody walked over to his lab door and opened it.

"Come on in." he said.

Sherman walked in and his mouth opened again.

Inside there were white tables holding chemical test tubes, countertops holding various electronic parts, gadgets, and giant server racks with their lights flashing.

"What is this place?" Sherman asked.

"My lab." Peabody said. "I invented the WABAC in here. You were lying over there in your cradle when I first thought of the idea, but I was able to finish it in time for your first birthday." He smiled fondly.

Then he pulled a free-standing whiteboard over to where Sherman had sat down in one of the chairs and jumped up onto the platform in front of it in order reach the whole board. He pulled out a sharpie marker and began to draw. "Now, first thing I need to do is calculate…" he began muttering to himself.

Sherman had no idea what any of what Peabody was drawing meant, it looked like math, but there was a lot of numbers and a whole bunch of symbols he didn't recognize. All he knew were the plus and minus signs.

Peabody stopped writing for a moment and tapped the marker against his snout, thinking.

Sherman took this moment to ask him.

"What memories do you have of us?"

Peabody looked at him. "All of them of course." He said.

"Can you tell me one?" Sherman asked.

Peabody smiled as he waved his marker around. "Well, this one does come to mind, it was Christmas 2010, and you were beyond excited. You couldn't get to sleep, even after I read you the Night Before Christmas, you still had so many questions, like how Santa would deliver your presents since we didn't have a chimney." He chuckled as his eyes lit up at the memory. "You were very disobedient, and kept waking me up, but finally morning arrived and you were so excited."

Sherman grinned.

"Another involves the WABAC-"

Sherman gasped. "Really? Where'd we go?"

"We went to visit Vincent Van Gogh to get some painting lessons from him. Did you know you were the one who inspired him to create his famous Starry Night art piece?"

Sherman's mouth opened. "I did? How?"

Peabody smirked. "By being impertinent again. I had given you a canvas so you could draw on your own, but you decided the wall was much better for the artistic vision you had, so you began to paint on Mr. Van Gogh's wall with a deep dark blue using your hands, and once he saw it, he had a stroke of artistic genius and created the painting now known as 'Starry Night'"

Sherman gazed at Mr. Peabody in wonder. "Wow…" To think he had influenced history…

"When you learned to ride a bike was pretty notable as well. You had insisted you were ready to ride a bike without training wheels and I had agreed, you were already very good on your training wheels. So, I took you in the WABAC to Mannheim Germany, 1817 to visit Karl von Drais, the inventor of the first bicycle, where… you…"

Suddenly Peabody faltered, Sherman watched as Peabody scrunched up his face, fear mixing with his expression.

"Where I what? What's wrong, Mr. Peabody?" He asked, frowning.

"I- I can't remember… why can't I remember!?" Peabody asked himself, holding his head in one paw.

He couldn't remember what happened next. He knew he used to know, it was on the tip of his tongue, but it was as if his memory stopped right at the point they left the WABAC in 1817.

He picked another memory.

"I don't know why I can't remember, maybe it will come back to me. But another was the time I took you to one of Jackie Robinsons baseball games. You were a fan of baseball at the time, and so you had brought your baseball glove. Mr. Robinson had hit a home run, and the ball was headed into the stands, and I boosted you up to catch it, and you did, but you fumbled, and… I…"

Again, he couldn't remember what happened next.

He grew even more fearful and suddenly a lightbulb lit up in his head. He began to pace in front of the whiteboard. "It must be due to the timeline change, my memories are slowly being altered, and the longer I stay in this timeline, the more I will forget…"

He began furiously writing on the board again. "We are on the proverbial clock now…"

"What's wrong Mr. Peabody?" Sherman asked.

"I believe that the longer I remain in this timeline, the more I will forget, and my memories will be replaced, and I will assume this timeline is the correct one…" Peabody said absently.

Before Sherman could reply to that, he screamed and held his head in his hands as it suddenly split with a massive headache. He fell to the floor still clutching it, and the last thing he heard before he passed out was Peabody yelling his name and seeing his back paws thumping onto the floor in front of him as he jumped down and rushed over.

* * *

 _He woke up and flung the covers off himself. Birthdays were always fun in the Peabody household. Mr. Peabody would most likely take him somewhere in the WABAC today._

 _5-soon-to-be-6-year-old Sherman tiptoed down the hall to his father's room. He opened the door as quietly as he could and snuck inside. He saw his father still lying on his bed, still as a statue._

 _Good. Mr. Peabody's still sleeping._

 _He slowly and carefully tiptoed over and began to crawl onto the bed. Peabody's back was facing him._

 _He braced himself, jumped into the air and yelled "aarrghh!". He intended to land on his father and scare him awake but just as he jumped Peabody whirled around in the bed and stretched his paws out and yelled back._

 _It was startling, but he was already in the air, headed right for Peabody. He landed right into Peabody's open arms onto his furry chest. Peabody lay there holding him tightly in his arms, tossing side to side, growling playfully._

 _He laughed and tried to escape, gripping the sheets, but his father was too strong and held him tight._

 _Peabody stopped moving and let him go. "Happy birthday Sherman." He said._

" _Aww, how did you know I was here Mr. Peabody?" he asked._

 _Peabody chuckled. "I have excellent hearing; I could hear you sneaking in."_

 _He quickly dove under the covers and snuggled himself next to Peabody's fur. Suddenly his father stiffened. Why did he stiffen?_

" _Do you want to go to sleep again Sherman? We just woke up." Peabody asked, frowning._

 _He looked up and smiled. "No. It's just warm and cozy in your bed." They lay there for a few moments, him mostly enjoying the company and his father's warm fur and body heat._

 _He finally piped up. "Mr. Peabody?"_

 _Mr. Peabody looked at him. "Yes Sherman?"_

 _He fixed him with a worried expression. "Do I have to inhurit your job?"_

 _Peabody chuckled again. "It's inhEHrit, Sherman, and what are you talking about?"_

 _He was ever so slightly hurt by the correction and tone in which it was given, but regardless he snuggled his head in closer to the fur right under Peabody's neck and said "Johnny at kindergarten says that he has to do what his dad does when he gets older. He says he has to 'inheerit' his dad's job. His dad told him that. But I don't want to do what you do, I want to study dinosaurs!"_

 _It was a few seconds before Peabody answered. He cleared his throat. "Sherman…" He began slowly. "You are under no obligation to undertake my livelihood when I pass."_

 _What does that mean? He cocked his head. "Huh?"_

 _Peabody laughed. "It means you don't have to do what I do when you get older."_

" _Oh," He was relieved now. "But Johnny's family-"_

" _We're not Johnny's family Sherman, we don't do what they do." Peabody interrupted him._

" _However, there is a difference between taking on my life's work when you get older and inheriting. Just because you are 'inheriting my job' does not mean you have to do it. You could…" Peabody hesitated. "sell off parts of it, or even the whole company to someone else. But I would hope that you will keep it, and make it as successful as I have, maybe even more so." He finished, smiling._

" _Now," he sat up and clapped his paws together. "Since it's your birthday I have the whole day planned out, first we'll have a breakfast of pancakes with strawberries and whipped cream and then we'll go to the beach."_

 _He burst into a wide smile. "You mean it Mr. Peabody!? I've always wanted to go to the beach!"_

" _Yes, and if you hurry we can leave right after breakfast." Peabody said excitedly._

 _He flung the covers off them, bounced off the bed, and shot out the door to get dressed._

* * *

" _Sherman? Sherman!"_

The voice was muffled but it was getting closer. Or rather, he was getting closer to consciousness.

Sherman came to in Peabody's lab, Peabody was leaning over him, shaking him.

He groaned and fluttered his eyes, the headache he had was now rapidly abating.

"Oh thank goodness," Peabody sat down in relief. "What happened Sherman?"

"I dunno… I had another dream, I guess…"

"What was it about?" Peabody asked.

"It was my birthday… I was turning 6… I snuck up on you in bed… I thought you were sleeping, but you knew I was coming." He said slowly. "Then we just talked."

Peabody slowly smiled as Sherman described it.

"I remember that day, despite being a young child, and in no position to inherit anything, you were still worried about it."

"But you were… different."

Peabody sighed. "Yes, I suppose I was colder and more distant back then." He smiled as he looked at Sherman. "But a recent event helped me realize just how much you mean to me."

He and Sherman stood back up and Peabody continued writing his calculations, interspersed with stories from Sherman's childhood, ones he could remember at least.

All too soon, Sherman had to go. He looked at the clock above the door and gasped, "I gotta go or I'll be late for dinner!"

"Thanks for everything, but I don't know how I can help you with the time contin-cont-the time thing, I gotta go, bye." Sherman said quickly as he got down from the chair and gathered the bag of clothes Mr. Peabody had given him and his backpack and made his way out the door of the lab and over to the elevator.

Peabody followed him. "Did you want me to walk you back to the foster home?"

"S'ok, I know the way." Sherman smiled.

"Well my door, or rather, my elevator is always open, come over anytime." Peabody said, smiling back. It felt weird saying that to his own son.

"Thanks, bye Mr. Peabody." Sherman said as the doors closed, and Peabody was left alone.

He walked back to his lab and continued writing his calculations.

Suddenly, an alarm went off. He went over to one of the computers in the room and pulled up the security camera feed of where it was coming from. Since it was a weekend and his receptionist was not working, he had programmed the motion sensors in the lobby to go off if anyone came inside, likely wanting to see him.

He looked at the camera feed of the lobby, and noticed someone standing in front of the counter, looking around. Peabody recognized them as the local news reporter.

" _What does the media want?"_ He sighed, exasperated.

He strode to the elevator and rode it all the way to the bottom floor. As he stepped out, he straightened his glasses and bow tie and the person noticed him and walked over.

"Hello Mr. Peabody, my name is Kelly Jackson with The Herald Examiner, and I was wondering if I could ask you a couple questions?"

The woman who addressed him had long straight black hair done in a straight ponytail and looked at him with piercing blue eyes.

He tried to be cordial. "I'm sorry Ms. Jackson, but it is a Sunday, and I am very busy-"

"This will only take a few minutes, I'm trying to make tomorrows newspaper." She smiled, but Peabody could tell it was a fake smile.

Peabody sighed again. "Alright, what did you want to know?"

Peabody thanked his lucky stars that she hadn't come 5 or 10 minutes earlier and caught him with Sherman. He would've made him stay up in the penthouse anyways, his rule of not allowing Sherman's face to be shown on the media still applied, timeline change or not.

Kelly lifted a notepad she was carrying and placed her pen on it. "Mr. Peabody, is it true you are thinking of adopting a human boy?"

Peabody was taken aback, he guessed it would be about Sherman, but that went too far with assumptions. "I-I beg your pardon, where on earth did you get such an idea?"

Kelly scribbled furiously on her notepad. "I'm sure you are aware you have been spotted with a local orphan boy, which is highly irregular. Given all your causes, you've still never been particularly fond of children's charities. What is your purpose for spending time with this boy?" she asked, looking up at him. "Are you thinking about beginning to support children's charities or causes?"

Rather than attempt a feeble answer, Peabody remained quiet while he rapidly tried to think of answer that would make sense.

"Yes, I am… exploring the possibilities of what I could accomplish in the space of our societies orphaned youth." He smiled.

"By adopting an orphaned boy? Or something else?"

"No, I am not sure yet, I am exploring my options." This was also a waste of time, he needed to get back to work.

He clapped his paws together. "Well, this has been great, but I need to get back to my work," he ushered Kelly back to the revolving door.

"Ok, well is it alright if I come back to do a follow up interview?" she asked.

"Yes, that will be fine." Peabody smiled, just wanting her to go away.

She finally left and he internally sighed, rubbing the bridge of his snout.

"The media is a right pain in my side sometimes…" He needed to finish those calculations, but he needed refreshment first…

As the elevator doors to his penthouse opened, the phone rang.

He let out an annoyed groan and walked over to the phone.

" _If this is another reporter I swear…"_

He smiled and answered it. "Peabody residence, this is he."

"That looked like an interesting interview."

At first, he didn't recognize the voice. "I beg your pardon, who is this?"

"You don't know me? My my my, I'm offended Hector, it's only been 2 months since we last talked."

Peabody's eyes widened and he froze. There were **very** few people who knew his first name, and even fewer who actually called him by it.

"Richmond Wolf?"

"Ah, so you do remember me, yes, it is I, Richmond Wolf. So tell me, how has life without your precious Sherman been?"

Richmond did it. Peabody didn't know why or how he did but he did. His hate for this man suddenly bubbled up stronger than ever now.

"So you did do this!" he growled into the phone, sputtering. "Wh-why? How?"

"Yes, of course I did, an eye for an eye, as I always say."

Richmond's calmness only enraged Peabody more. But he managed to muddle through the emotions threatening to overwhelm him and ask the important question.

"An ey-? What do you mean? Did I do you wrong?!"

Richmond's dry, humorless laugh came through the phone loud and clear.

"Did you do me wrong? Oh my word, that's a good one Hector, of course you did!"

"What did I do?" He honestly didn't know.

"Do you seriously not remember? Let me give you a refresher…"


	9. Epicenter

**August 2013**

"Daddy! Are we going yet?!"

Richmond turned at the sound of his daughters voice.

His eyes quickly widened once he saw what she was doing. She was zooming slowly around his workshop on a round piece of metal that was emitting a humming noise.

"Sophia! Get off the hoverboard!" He quickly picked her up once she passed close to him and set her on the ground. The hoverboard almost immediately stopped and he turned it off and picked it up.

"This is not a toy, it is a prototype, and the only one I have, so if it breaks before we get to the NYTSE, I'll have nothing to show them." He said while holding it and glaring at Sophia sternly.

Sophia looked at the ground sheepishly. "Sorry Daddy…"

He softened. "It's ok, I know you didn't mean any harm." He placed the board back on his workshop table. "Now, as for when we are going, it will be soon. I just need to perform some finishing calibrations on the board."

"Can I watch you do them?" she asked, walking forward.

"Are you sure? They're not going to be very interesting to a child." He asked, chuckling.

Sophia put on an expression as if she was offended, her mouth opening in mock horror. "I'm not a child daddy! I'm 11 years old! I'm a preteen!"

Richmond couldn't help but laugh, his daughter's facial expressions were always so amusing. "Sorry, I forgot. They won't be very interesting to a preteen." He corrected.

"Well can I watch anyway?" she asked.

Richmond didn't care one way or the other. "If you wish." He plugged a cable that was sitting on the bench into the hoverboard and turned to a computer keyboard and screen and began typing. Sophia grabbed a chair and kneeled on it backward, hands on the backrest, watching intently.

"So, you really like my work huh?" Richmond asked absently as he typed and looked at the monitor.

"Yeah! It's so cool! I wanna do what you do when I grow up!"

Richmond turned to her and smirked. "I thought you said you weren't a child anymore?"

"I'm not! When I grow up more I mean." She quickly clarified.

"Uh huh." Richmond was absently typing away again.

Sophia frowned. "Though some kids at school think I'm weird for liking this stuff."

Richmond turned to her, frowning. "Why?"

Sophia sighed. "Because I'm a girl."

Richmond lifted his eyes heavenward in exasperation for a moment before turning his full attention to her and putting his hands on her shoulders.

"Soph, don't listen to them." He said pausing. "You want to become a scientist?, go for it. Just because you are a girl doesn't mean you can do things a man can't. Women are severely underrepresented in the STEM fields. We need more women and their also brilliant minds contributing to science."

Sophia smiled, encouraged by her father's words. "What's STEM?" she asked.

"Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. It's just an acronym that groups all the forward-thinking fields together." He said, turning back to the keyboard.

"And the calibrations are done." He announced. "Time to go!"

Sophia hopped off the chair excitedly. "Is Mr. Peabody going to be there?" she asked, skipping to the door.

Richmond frowned, mentions of Mr. Peabody always got him on edge. "Yes." He said simply.

"I've never met him before, I think it'll be cool to meet a talking dog!" she said, oblivious to Richmond's betrayal of his dislike of said dog.

He said nothing and followed her through the door, locking it behind him.

She finally turned around and looked at him. He tried to smile before she could notice his scowl but failed.

"Why don't you like Mr. Peabody?" she asked as they walked into the penthouse's living room.

Richmond sighed. "As I've said before, I don't **not** like him, he's just annoying because he always seems to do better than me, he graduated from Harvard, magna cum laude, valedictorian, and I barely made cum laude, he started his own company, named after him of course, which took off in a matter of months and I struggled with my startup."

"Oh." Sophia said as they entered the elevator that would take them to the ground floor of the building. "Well… why do you care that he's more successful than you? There will always be someone better and worse than you."

"Because he's a dog! He's proving that somehow humans are inferior to him, and I need to prove him wrong." He finally processed her second sentence and smiled gently at her as they stood in the elevator. "Where do you get your wisdom from? It certainly didn't come from me."

"Maybe Mom?" Sophia asked timidly.

"Yeah, maybe." He frowned again. His wife and Sophia's mother's death was a sensitive subject for both of them.

The elevator finally reached the ground floor and they both quietly walked to the car and drove to the convention center.

The New York Technological Sciences Expo, or NYTSE as it was unofficially called, was an annual expo held in New York where the technological scientists of the world would gather to present their latest inventions, discoveries, or any other technological marvels they had to show to wow the public. It wasn't a contest, there were no prizes given out, but as far as Richmond was concerned, it was a contest.

Once they arrived, Richmond pulled into the parking garage and parked, they got out and Richmond pulled out his hoverboard from the trunk and they both began walking. Richmond focused his brown eyes on his phone as he checked the time. "Perfect, just in time." The 30-year-old said as they walked toward the door that would lead into the convention center.

Richmond Wolf, one of the leading technological scientists at the expo, was here to present his latest invention, a hoverboard.

They pushed open the doors from the parking garage into the center and walked toward the stage area, passing by the bathrooms.

"This is so exciting!" Sophia said eagerly.

Richmond couldn't help but smile as well. But his smile fell shortly after as noticed a certain bespectacled beagle walking toward them from a different hallway.

Mr. Peabody. The one being whose genius rivaled his own. He did not like that dog. Ever since college, where they had met each other in the same theoretical physics class, they had gotten on each other's nerves, each one upping the other with better grades and inventions. And from Richmond's point of view, Mr. Peabody had gotten more 'wins' than him. And that drove him mad. Their personalities even clashed as well.

"Ah, Mr. Wolf. Welcome." Peabody greeted as he neared Richmond.

"Hector." Richmond said curtly.

Peabody stopped and frowned slightly. If he was bothered or offended by Richmond's use of his first name, he didn't continue to show it.

He hitched a smile back on his muzzle. "Is this your daughter?" he asked, holding a paw out towards Sophia.

"Yes, Sophia, this is Mr. Peabody, Mr. Peabody this is my daughter Sophia." Richmond said, quickly getting the introductions over with.

"H-hi Mr. Peabody!" Sophia said, unable to contain her excitement. "It's so cool to finally meet you!"

Mr. Peabody made an acknowledging gesture, tilting his head down. "Of course, and you as well, Ms. Wolf. Richmond has discussed you at length many times before. His fondness for you is quite evident." He smiled.

"Do you still like to do dog things?" She asked, not thinking.

Under normal social circumstances, Richmond would have scolded Sophia for asking such an immature question, but because he already disliked Peabody, he allowed the question to hang in the air.

Peabody didn't miss a beat. Instead of being caught off guard, he leaned in closer to Sophia, like he was going to tell her a secret. "Well, truthfully my instincts are still ever present, but I have mostly mastered them, instead of them mastering me. But I will let you in on a little secret, Sherman will occasionally use them to his advantage when he wants something and throw a ball through the penthouse that I can't resist chasing."

Sophia giggled. "That's funny! Where is Sherman? Is he here?"

"No, unfortunately he has school, and I couldn't keep him for a day to come here. Besides, he's already seen the technology powering my invention many, many times…" Peabody trailed off.

"Ok ok that's enough chit chat, let's go, don't want to be late." Richmond said, and all 3 of them continued down the carpeted hallway toward the stage.

"So what is your invention?" Sophia asked Peabody as they walked into the auditorium, where a crowd was already gathering.

Peabody pulled out a round circular metal device that he had slung behind his back. It was rather large and looked heavy. "This is my wormhole generator."

Richmond scoffed. "Pft, sure it is. No one's solved the Einstein field equations"

"I actually have." Peabody said smugly. "A wormhole, also called an Einstein-Rosen Bridge, is a concept that represents a non-trivial solution of the Einstein field equations using the Kasner metric: a non-trivial resolution of the Ehrenfest paradox structure linking separate points in spacetime."

Richmond gawked at him. He couldn't believe his ears. "How? I've been at them for years now, and I'm no closer now than when I started!"

Peabody smirked. "I think I'd rather keep that a secret."

Richmond growled. "You self righteous dog! Those should be shared with the world! Solving the Einstein field equations would open up so many avenues in scientific discovery! I can't believe you! You're so big headed you won't share your discoveries with the world! I do! For the betterment of the human race!"

"You only share your inventions and discoveries so that the awe of the public can inflate your already overinflated ego!" Peabody spat.

"Like you don't already have one too!" Richmond yelled.

They both finally noticed that they were being watched by pretty much everyone else that was within earshot.

They quickly became self-conscious and stopped arguing.

Sophia was quiet, unsure what to say or do.

Peabody cleared his throat and checked the time. "Well, you're up first. From one scientist to another… break a leg."

Richmond could only assume the dog meant it literally. "Yeah, I'll do that…" he said sarcastically.

Peabody and Sophia sat down in two of the front row seats reserved for the other scientists and their family members, and Richmond walked over to the stage.

He glanced out into the audience and noticed the large auditorium had been filled and they were buzzing with excitement. He waited as the stage assistants verified his mic was working.

He plastered a smile on his face and finally walked up onto the large stage to the blinding stage lights. He was a natural, he had long since gotten over his stage fright.

"Hello everyone," he said. "As you might already know, my name is Richmond Wolf, and I specialize in theoretical and quantum physics. However, I have something simple for you today."

He pulled the hoverboard from behind his back and placed it on the stage floor. It looked a lot like a skateboard.

He stood back up very briefly, and then leaned back down and flipped a switch. He stood back up, and for a brief second, the hoverboard did nothing. Then, it began to hum, and suddenly, it jumped up about 6 inches in the air and stayed there, hovering in midair.

There was gasps of surprise and murmurs from the audience as they clapped.

Richmond moved his arms around over the board. "As you can see, this is not a trick of any kind, no strings. I have invented the worlds first working hoverboard."

"Now as for how it's doing that, to put it in the simplest terms: I am simply manipulating the gravitational field around the board, allowing it to hover. Now, since there is no one on it, it is not using that much energy. However," he placed one foot on the board. "once someone steps onto it, the energy consumption goes up dramatically. That is one fault with it, which I intend to fix. As you can imagine, with how small it is, the power source is not very big, so I will only get a few minutes of usage out of it before it dies."

He quickly stepped onto the board and placed his other foot on it, holding his arms out slightly for balance. The board started humming louder, indicating its higher energy output.

Richmond leaned forward slightly and slowly the board began to move in the direction he had leaned. He leaned forward more and began to go faster. For a few moments, he just zoomed around the stage, back and forth, showing off his invention.

He stopped at the center again and hopped off, combining leaning down to pick up the board and a bow in one.

The audience clapped and cheered, they loved it. Richmond stayed on the stage for a few more moments, basking in the adoration.

Once it died down he walked off the stage. As he did Peabody passed him, on his way up to the stage to present his invention. "Very good Richmond, I was thoroughly impressed." He said.

Richmond smirked but said nothing; just glad to know he had at least won the dogs approval.

He went and sat down next to Sophia, who was bouncing up and down. "You did great daddy!" she said happily.

He looked at her and smiled. "Thanks Soph."

She immediately frowned. "But I really need to go to the bathroom, but I don't want to miss Mr. Peabody's invention!" she said as she continued bouncing, making it immediately evident excitement was not the only reason for her bouncing.

"Well if I know Mr. Peabody, he's probably going to ramble on and on about how great his invention is before he starts demonstrating it, so if you hurry, you might be able to make it back before he shows it."

"Ok!" And with that Sophia shot off towards the doors they had entered, quickly opening and closing them and running for the bathrooms.

Richmond settled back in his seat with his arms folded as he watched Peabody climb the stage steps. This ought to be good. He half hoped the invention wouldn't work or would work but then break.

He stopped thinking and just focused his attention on Peabody.

The audience had started clapping before he had even reached the stage, so well known Peabody was.

He walked to the center of the stage and cleared his throat.

"Salutations, my name is Mr. Peabody, as I'm sure you all know already, given the applause I received before I even stepped a paw on the stage." He chuckled.

Richmond rolled his eyes.

"Unlike my colleague Mr. Wolf, I have a very special invention to show you today, and I believe it will change the course of humanity as we know it. I was inspired by my son Sherman to create this invention a long time ago and I believe now is the right time to show it to the world…" Peabody said as he pulled his wormhole generator out from behind his back again.

It was mostly silver colored due to most of it being made out of metal and looked a lot like a miniature mounted gun. There was a little screen on top that Peabody kept looking at, likely a control panel.

Richmond wondered where Sophia was, she was taking a while, and Peabody in his typical Peabody fashion was droning on and on about his invention but getting close to his demonstration.

"…and perhaps rather than telling you, I should just demonstrate how it works instead."

Peabody pointed the end of his generator at an empty area of the stage, pulled a trigger, and suddenly a blue energy field came shooting out of the device with a loud _whoosh!_ and stopped in midair, forming an oval shape.

The audience was so stunned they didn't do anything, some had their mouths open, Richmond included.

Peabody turned around, tapped on the little screen, pointed the device at an empty area of the stage opposite, and pulled the trigger again. The same thing happened, another blue oval shaped portal appeared in midair.

Peabody turned to the audience. "I have created a wormhole generator." He stated simply as he walked over to one of the portals.

"It is perfectly safe," he said, stepping one foot into the portal and immediately stepping out of the other on the other side of the stage as if it was nothing. "I have tested it many, many times."

The audience finally realized what had just happened and gave Peabody a standing ovation.

Peabody smiled and acknowledged it, looking down at the screen on the generator and tapping a button, making both portals disappear.

Richmond, despite not wanting to, was reluctantly standing and clapping along with the rest of the audience, so as to not be the odd one out.

The audience finally sat down again and Peabody took it as a signal that they wanted to see more.

"Using the power of the space time continuum, which I have harnessed, I can even create portals oriented up and down." He said.

He quickly tapped some more buttons on the touchscreen as Richmond looked at his watch. Sophia wasn't back yet and it had been way too long. But before he could excuse himself, something happened.

Peabody aimed the generator at the ceiling and pulled the trigger.

The generator made the same sound it had before, but instead of a blue energy ball coming out of it, it just emitted a blue light and then went _fzzt!_

Peabody chuckled nervously. "I-it normally is not supposed to that." He looked closer at the little screen, perplexed.

"Let me try again." He pointed the generator at the ceiling and pulled the trigger again.

The exact same thing happened. Richmond smiled. _"Not as perfect as you though huh?"_

"Well, I guess there are definitely still some bugs I need to work out." Peabody said.

He quickly ended his demonstration and the audience clapped again regardless, they had seen Peabody's invention work at least once.

He walked down the stage steps and sat down next to Richmond, who smirked at him.

"Well, nothing's foolproof." He said.

"I am sure the portals' event horizons manifested, the generator said they did." Peabody said, half to himself, half to Richmond.

"Well I'm going to check on Sophia, she went to the bathroom and hasn't returned." Richmond said.

Peabody nodded, deep in thought.

Richmond stood up and walked over to the doors and pushed through them. He made his way down the carpeted hallway and stopped at the woman's bathroom and knocked.

"Sophia?" he asked.

Upon receiving no answer, he pushed the door open.

His heart jumped into his throat when he saw the bathroom was completely empty.


	10. Does He Really?

**Present Day**

Peabody was silent as Richmond finished.

"Richmond," he began slowly. "I am very sorry about your daughter missing, but I still fail to see how this is my fault."

"Sorry won't bring my daughter back. After you left, I remained at the expo, looking in vain for her. I finally had the security people there bring up the camera recordings. We were able to find her in the hallway on the way back from the bathrooms, but as we watched we saw one of your wormhole portals open on the wall and she was sucked in!" his voiced raised with every sentence. "And this happened while you were demonstrating your wormhole generator!"

Peabody was speechless. He stared ahead at nothing in horror. It was a moment before he found his voice.

"I- Richmond I am so very sorry, but I did not do that on purpose. Truthfully, I did have one instance where I thought the portal had failed to materialize, but I suppose it did, just at the wrong point in space…"

"And where do you suppose the other one was hmm? On the moon maybe?" The joke did nothing.

"I… truthfully do not know, but Richmond, why didn't you tell me?! I would have helped you!"

"Why would I think you would help me?! I was under the impression you had done it on purpose!"

He paused.

"I think you're lying! You did it on purpose just so you could distract me and bring me down even more! You always were so arrogant! You think because of all your accomplishments that makes you better than us? Well they don't invalidate the fact you're just a dog!" Richmond's unrelenting biting tone came through the phone loud and clear.

Peabody was beginning to lose his temper. "Richmond, you are not thinking straight! You are blinded by your jealousy of me! I truly did not make your daughter disappear on purpose!"

He took a deep breath, calming himself, when suddenly he had an idea. Maybe he could play to Richmond's ego to calm him down.

"Now, if you are quite finished with your outrage, I would love for you to calm down and explain how you accomplished this timeline change so we can change it back to the way it was and I can begin helping you find your daughter." he said.

Of course he also just wanted his Sherman back, but keeping Richmond cooled down would help.

It worked. Richmond couldn't help but explain the device he created. "I created a time machine that manipulates the tachyonic energy of the time space continuum and creates a new timeline based on my inputs."

Peabody was fascinated. "Interesting, and how did you account for the butterfly effect?"

"The machine scans the timeline and calculates the minimum changes needed to effect the wanted changes."

"And how do you power the device? Surely the power requirements are astronomical."

"Oh, they were. I had to generate a synthetic singularity, a black hole if you will, to power it."

Peabody suddenly became very worried. It's not that he didn't trust Richmond knew what he was doing, he just knew how dangerous black holes were, especially after having experienced one just a month ago. **He** had known what he was doing, but still him, Sherman and Penny had only very narrowly escaped being sucked into it.

"Richmond, black holes are very dangerous, if you make even the slightest miscalculation, something could go catastrophically wrong, I know because-"

"There you go again, downplaying my achievements. I must say Hector, I thought you would be more concerned for Sherman than me." Richmond's careless tone came through the phone.

Peabody began to wonder why in the world he ever decided to work with this man, he was really beginning to agitate him.

Through gritted teeth and suppressed growls, he tried to continue the conversation. "I **am** concerned for Sherman… just… tell me where you are located, and I can come over and we can begin to repair the timeline."

"No, I think not. I should also tell you Peabody, I didn't just change the timeline because I was jealous of you, I changed it for Sherman."

Peabody's brows furrowed in confusion. "What do you mean?"

"I never told you, but I always believed your adoption of him was wrong. And when my daughter disappeared I finally had multiple reasons to make your life miserable. Because that's all you've done is make mine miserable! I never get recognized! I'm always associated with you! I'm sick of it! So, in doing this, I've helped Sherman by making sure he got placed with a human family."

"But he is not happy there!" Peabody countered. "He's not even in a real home! He's in a foster home!"

"Well at least he's with his own kind." Richmond said. "Goodbye Hector." And suddenly the phone line clicked.

Peabody suddenly began to feel déjà vu. Ms. Grunion was the only other person who had given him this feeling and now he was feeling it again.

He stared at the phone for a few seconds, not believing the conversation he had just had. Richmond was really off his rocker. He shook his head and placed the phone back on its cradle.

He would fix the timeline, with or without Richmond's help. And he had part of a plan of just how he was going to do that…

* * *

Sherman ran all the way from Peabody's penthouse back to Hard Rock. He was slightly worried. It seemed more and more that Peabody was telling the truth, but whether he still wanted that other life was in question.

Peabody had felt so cold and distant in that memory, completely unlike the dog he was now. What had happened? He didn't know, but he figured if Peabody was like that before, who says he wouldn't be again?

Sherman finally skidded to a stop at the front door and gingerly opened it. He walked inside and noticed Mr. Harper sitting by the fireplace in the living room, scrubbing it with a metal brush, cleaning it and getting it ready for the cold months ahead.

He noticed Sherman and paused his work. "Hey there Sherman, how was your visit with Mr. Peabody?" he asked as he dusted his coal black hands off.

"Ok." Sherman said. He walked into the living room and sat down on the couch.

"That doesn't sound very enthusiastic for someone who just visited probably the most expensive penthouse in all of Manhattan, _twice_." Mr. Harper said as he resumed scrubbing the fireplace.

"Something weird happened." Sherman said. Mr. Harper stopped scrubbing again and looked at him.

"Well what happened?"

Sherman looked at him.

"I…I had a dream, but it wasn't a dream, I know it was real, and it gave me a headache, it hurt…" he said, his brows scrunching up in confusion as he tried to explain something even he didn't quite understand.

Mr. Harper was blank, he didn't really understand either. "Oh. Is it related to Mr. Peabody and all this time travel business?"

Sherman nodded.

"Well then I think maybe you'd better stay away from him for a couple days, just to be safe." He said.

For once, Sherman fully agreed with Mr. Harper, he didn't really want to be around Mr. Peabody anymore.

Key word 'really'.

"Just please don't tell Mrs. Harper, I don't want her to stop me from seeing him." Sherman asked fervently.

Mr. Harper nodded his head in agreement. "Of course."

He watched as Sherman walked upstairs and smiled after him. The last few days were the happiest he had ever seen Sherman before. He didn't care Mr. Peabody was a dog, as long as he could supply a proper loving home for Sherman, he didn't mind Mr. Peabody adopting him one bit.

Sherman went back to his room and stayed there, reading what books hadn't been destroyed by the bullies, mainly the ones Mr. Peabody had gotten him. His bag of new clothes from Mr. Peabody lay untouched in the corner.

After a while, his eye was drawn to it, and he realized he was still wearing his old clothes and that he hadn't changed into them. He slowly got up and walked over to it and picked it up and brought it over to his bed.

He gently opened it and turned it upside down and the shirts, shorts, and new shoes came tumbling out onto the bed. He picked up a blue shirt, and quickly changed into it and a new pair of black pants. He put the new shoes on and smiled as he walked around his room in them. He enjoyed the feeling of no duct tape, and his feet were completely draft free.

If he could get new things like this all the time if he lived with Mr. Peabody maybe it wouldn't be so bad…

Soon it was time for dinner. Mrs. Harper asked Sherman how his visit with Mr. Peabody went and Sherman told them all about it, leaving out the part about fainting and experiencing his prior memory and Mr. Harper didn't say anything about it.

After dinner it was time for bed and Sherman got into bed and slept soundly, without any previous memories returning or dreams, good or bad.

* * *

The next day was Monday, so Sherman got up, got dressed in some of Mr. Peabody's new clothes, and went downstairs for breakfast. Everyone was again already at the breakfast table, so Sherman quickly sat down and helped himself and soon they were all on the bus again.

School passed normally as well. Until recess.

Sherman was happily swinging on the swings when he suddenly noticed a strange man leaning against the swing set's support pole nearest him. The school playground wasn't completely closed off, so he definitely could've walked in.

The man had brown hair and was holding a newspaper. He spoke when he saw Sherman had noticed him.

"You're pretty famous you know. You're in the newspaper. Well… not directly at least."

Sherman skidded to a stop. "What do you mean? Who are you?" he asked, eyeing the man warily.

The man shrugged. "No one, I just wanted to make sure you knew about it, and how that dog doesn't actually care about you." He walked over and leaned down so Sherman was eye level with him.

"Here, take a look for yourself." He handed Sherman the newspaper.

Sherman took it and looked at the front page.

" _Genius Dog Mr. Peabody To Support Another Charity?"_ The front page read.

Sherman scanned the interview.

 _Mr. Peabody was recently seen with a local orphan boy currently staying at a foster home in New York City. While not one typically known for his work in the space of child welfare, it seems Mr. Peabody might have changed his mind. When asked if he planned on supporting any children's charities in the future he stated: "Yes, I am… exploring the possibilities of what I could accomplish in the space of our societies orphaned youth." When asked if he intended on adopting the orphan he stated he was not and was only "exploring his options."_

Before Sherman could ask another question, the man spoke again.

"He's just trying to get in societies good graces, he doesn't care about you."

Sherman wasn't sure what to believe, but he was still leaning on the side of Mr. Peabody.

"No, you're wrong, he loves me, he even said so." He scowled.

The man sucked in air through his teeth. "Does he really? I mean, you know he's done this before, always giving to various charities, and now he's just adding another one. He would never adopt a human boy, he knows society wouldn't allow it."

"Has he told you the story about how he adopted you in some other timeline?" he asked.

Sherman looked at him, eyes wide. "How did you know that?"

The man shrugged. "Because he's done that before too, whenever he wants something he will use that story or something like it. He's a very despicable dog."

Suddenly the man's phone rang. "Hold on just a second." He put a hand up and pulled it out and answered it.

"Hello?...What?... N- nonono, don't do that!... C-calm down!... You need to set the gravity dampeners to a higher power output, that should stabilize it and- what was that noise?... Ok, I'll be over there soon."

He put his phone back in his jacket pocket and turned back to Sherman.

"Keep the newspaper and think about what I said." He said as he began to walk out of the playground.

Sherman watched him go uncertainly. He looked down at the newspaper again. If what the strange man had said was true then the only thing he could do was go straight to the horse's mouth to confirm it, or rather in this case, dog's mouth.

Once school was over Sherman jumped onto the bus. Amongst the rambunctious laughter and talking of the other children he sat alone in his seat, thinking about what the strange man had said at recess.

Once the bus reached Hard Rock he, James, and the twins hopped off.

Inside, Sherman quickly got his question out. "I need to go see Mr. Peabody." He said in the kitchen, where Mrs. Harper were preparing dinner.

"Why?" she asked.

"I need to ask him something."

"What do you need to ask him?" she asked, turning from the counter where she was chopping a tomato up.

"If he… uuhhh…" Sherman didn't want to be truthful anymore, he knew Mrs. Harper would consider it a bad thing if he told her a strange man had talked to him during recess, and that wouldn't help his case.

"…wants to adopt me." Sherman finished with a halfhearted smile.

Mrs. Harper sighed as she placed her knife down and turned completely to face him. "Sherman, I don't think Mr. Peabody will be able to. While me and Mr. Harper are alright with it if he does, and while you may be completely ok with him adopting you too, I don't think society will allow him to."

"It's too strange a notion." she added after a pause.

"Well I just want to see him then. He said I could come over to his house anytime." Sherman said.

"Well alright, but be back after dinner." She acquiesced.

Sherman rushed forward and gave her a hug. "Thanks Mrs. Harper."

Mrs. Harper leaned down and hugged him back. "You're welcome Sherman." She smiled as she hugged him and then pushed him back so she could look him fully in the face.

"As long as you're happy, I'm happy for you. So if Mr. Peabody makes you happy, then you can see him as much as you want or he will allow and maybe even be adopted by him." She said.

Sherman nodded.

"Now be sure to be back by dinnertime." She said, as she wiggled a finger at him.

"Yes Mrs. Harper." Sherman said as he left the kitchen and Mrs. Harper went back to chopping her tomato.

He passed the living room and noticed all his foster siblings were in it playing a board game, they noticed him leaving and called out to him.

"Where are you going Sherman?" Jayce asked him.

"To see Mr. Peabody." He answered.

"Why?" James asked as he moved his piece over the board.

"To see if he'll adopt me."

"Well I'm sure he will, or at least plans to." James said. "Lucky you." He smiled sadly at Sherman.

"Can we come too?" Jayden asked excitedly.

"No!" Mrs. Harper yelled from the kitchen.

Sherman bid goodbye to his foster siblings and left out the back door. He met Mr. Harper on the short pathway to the garage where he had just come from a grocery shopping errand.

"Where are you going Sherman?" he asked as he moved the grocery bags he was holding equally to both hands.

"To see Mr. Peabody."

Mr. Harper looked at him quizzically. "But I thought you didn't want to see him for a few days?" he asked.

Sherman trusted Mr. Harper more than he trusted Mrs. Harper so he decided to tell him the truth.

"I need to talk to him about a strange man that talked to me at school today during recess-"

Mr. Harper had frowned the moment he heard 'strange man' and interrupted Sherman. "Sherman that is very suspicious, we should call the police and let the school know." He said, placing the groceries down on the cement walkway.

"But I think Mr. Peabody will know who he is, he seemed… really angry at him, calling him a despicable dog." Sherman said emphatically. "He also knew about how we've met and that Mr. Peabody said he adopted me in another timeline. Mrs. Harper said I could go, but to be back by dinner."

"Well, alright then." Mr. Harper said, picking up the grocery bags again.

Sherman said goodbye and left the alley and entered the sidewalk, heading for Mr. Peabody's penthouse.

As he walked he began to feel a slight sense of dread but didn't know why. He pushed it down and concentrated on what he would say to Mr. Peabody.


	11. Singularity

Peabody smiled as he looked at the device in his paws.

Given he had only had about 24 hours to rapidly come up with a design that was functional, aesthetics were not as important. So, while it looked like a sloppily thrown together metal detector, it seemed to work. It had detected the presence of a miniscule black hole only a few miles away.

The moment Richmond had mentioned singularity, ideas of building another WABAC had gone out the window, and Peabody was determined to fix the timeline by reversing whatever Richmond had done to it using that singularity, which would involve closing it. That was the easiest solution, **and** it would prevent another incident like the one that happened a month ago. Only this time it could be worse, this was a black hole, that had only been a wormhole that refused to close.

Peabody had no idea where the machine Richmond had built was located, the black hole detector told him in what general direction it was, but Richmond had most definitely placed security measures around it, so he had no idea how he was going to access it.

Suddenly the intercom in his lab went off and he heard the voice of his receptionist, Ashley crackle through the speaker.

" _Mr. Peabody? Are you there?"_

He went over to the button and pressed it. "Yes Ashley, what is it?"

" _There's a…boy here to see you?"_ She sounded confused. _"He says his name is Sherman."_

Peabody's eyes widened. "Let him up."

" _Yes Mr. Peabody."_

Peabody walked out of his lab and over the elevator carrying his device. Soon the elevator opened and Sherman stepped out.

Peabody smiled. "Hello Sherman, you're just in time to see my-" No sooner were the words out of his mouth before Sherman interrupted him.

"Do you really not care about me?" He asked with a scowl on his face.

Peabody was speechless, he opened his mouth and for a millisecond, nothing came out. Why would Sherman think such a thing?

"Yes of course I do! What on Earth makes you think such a thing?" he questioned, confused.

"You said you aren't going to adopt me." Sherman said, frowning.

Now Peabody was really confused. "I- I have never said any such thing Sherman."

"Yes you did, you said so in the newspaper."

"In th-?" Then it hit him. Sherman must have read whatever Ms. Jackson had written for her article.

He collected his thoughts and then spoke again, during which time Sherman had been staring at him despondently, brows creased.

"Sherman… I hope you understand I had to say whatever would cause the least amount of questions and media presence. Given of course the situation I have told you and the Harpers about, we cannot have people asking questions, that will hinder myself from fixing the timeline."

He smiled and put a paw on Sherman's shoulder. "Of course I care about you, it is because I care about you that I am trying to fix the timeline."

Slightly reassured, but still not having told Mr. Peabody everything yet, Sherman suddenly blurted out. "A strange man talked to me today at school."

Peabody's smile fell. "What? What did he want?"

"He's the one who gave me the newspaper and said that you don't really care about me and he knew about the timeline problem."

Peabody immediately knew who this strange man could be but still needed to confirm it. "What did he look like? Did he have brown hair and brown eyes? Maybe 30 years old?"

Sherman nodded.

Peabody growled and turned around, beginning to pace. Sherman felt slight déjà vu as he did so.

"Who does he think he is? Walking onto school grounds, talking to children, and then he has the nerve to tell you that I don't care?"

He let out a grunt of frustration shook his balled-up paws. "I swear the sooner we get the timeline fixed and that man out of our life the better."

"Who was he?" Sherman asked.

"Richmond Wolf, my…for lack of a better term, professional rival. He and I have been at odds ever since we've met. He is the one who caused the timeline change. Did anything else happen while you were talking?"

"Yeah, he got a call from somebody and said something about gravity dampeners? I dunno, he seemed anxious about it and quickly left after that."

Peabody gasped and suddenly pulled the black hole detector from around his back where he had slung it and pulled Sherman over to the elevator.

"Then we must hurry Sherman! The fate of the entire world, not just us, rests in the balance." He quickly pressed the button for the ground floor.

"Why? What's going to happen?!" Sherman asked.

"Richmond used a micro singularity, or what you might call a black hole to power his time device, and if he sounded anxious from what you said, he might be losing control of it and who knows what could happen! We need to help him fix it immediately!"

The doors opened at the ground floor and Peabody rushed out. "Come Sherman quick!"

After a slight hesitation Sherman quickly ran after him.

* * *

They walked for a couple of minutes, Sherman mainly following Peabody, and Peabody mainly looking at his black hole detector, which was making a beeping noise and had a radar-like screen on it. Sherman had had to stop Peabody from walking out into the street following it multiple times.

Peabody suddenly stopped and put a paw out and Sherman almost ran into it.

"What is it?" he asked.

Peabody turned around and noticed an empty garbage bag floating through the air, rapidly passing them and continuing on down the street, moving among the many various pedestrians on their evening commute.

"Sherman, what was strange about that grocery bag?" he asked, turning to face him.

Sherman didn't know, it looked like a normal floating garbage bag. "I dunno… it was floating…through the air…like normal?" he said, raising an eyebrow.

Peabody held a paw up. "There is no wind, or at the very least, not enough to make that bag move that fast… maybe this will be a better demonstration…"

He bent down and picked up a pebble that was lying on the sidewalk. He stood up, held out his paw and dropped it.

The pebble fell to the ground but did not fall straight down. It fell at an angle, hitting the ground just to the duo's left.

"The black hole's gravity is getting stronger, and while **we** can't feel the effects of its tidal forces yet because of our larger mass, we certainly will soon. Come Sherman, time is of the essence." He pulled his black hole detector out again and began to follow it, running down the street with Sherman following closely behind.

* * *

They finally reached what appeared to be the building that was housing the black hole. Peabody's black hole device said it was inside the building somewhere. It was a lone modern looking building situated near the piers on the Hudson River. As they walked to the doorway, they noticed there was a card key lock attached to it.

"How are we going to get in?" Sherman asked.

Peabody took a closer look at it and pulled on the door. It opened without issue.

"By simply walking in." he said, looking at Sherman in surprise.

As they both walked in they noticed that the light on the lock was green rather than red, indicating the door was unlocked. As they walked further in they noticed was that the building was completely empty. There was no one else in sight.

They also noticed that the black hole's tidal forces were beginning to affect them and could feel a small gravitational force acting on their bodies. From it, they were able to determine that the black hole was below them somewhere, so they began looking for a door leading down.

They walked further into the building, past the silver metallic reception desk and into a hallway.

At the end of the hall Peabody noticed an industrial door with a push bar that didn't have an exit sign. There was another key card lock attached to it and it was also green, indicating the door was unlocked.

"Why does this guy leave all his doors unlocked?" Sherman wondered aloud as they ran over to it and Peabody pushed it open. On the other side of the door was a metal staircase that led downwards.

"I have a feeling Richmond didn't leave them all unlocked on purpose…" Peabody said as he walked onto the metal staircase and began descending with Sherman following.

They reached the bottom which opened into a rocky tunnel. As they walked along it an alarm ringing met their ears and they could see flashing red alarm lights. They continued to follow the tunnel and it led to a control room where they saw the source of the red alarm lights flashing. All along the bottom edge of the room there were panels and computer screens and along the top edge were windows looking out and opposite them there was another door leading out.

"I believe the reason for the alarms and lights flashing is because the black hole has gotten out of control, but where is Richmond…?" Peabody wondered aloud.

They ran over to the other door and opened it and stepped out.

Sherman immediately gasped. They were standing in what appeared to be a very large hollowed out rocky cavern. There were various levels of metal catwalks surrounding the outer area that were connected via steep metal stairs. Industrial grade metal boxes of equipment were stacked up against each other near the rocky wall, and in the center, fairly below them, was a large open space with what Sherman could only guess was the black hole in question.

The space was large, but the black hole itself was small, about the size of a basketball. It was hovering in midair, and was completely black, surrounded by a large sphere of crisscrossing metal beams which he could only guess were the only devices that were keeping it in check.

Along with the klaxon alarms Peabody could also hear the creaking of metal as the tidal forces acted on it.

As they both looked around Peabody suddenly noticed Richmond leaning against another little control panel halfway around the room, frantically typing on the keyboard and flipping switches and pressing buttons.

"Richmond!" he yelled as he began to run around the catwalk toward him, Sherman following.

"Hector! What are you doing here?!" Richmond said, looking at him with wide eyes for a brief second before turning back to the panel he was working at and raising his voice over the blaring alarms and creaking metal.

"I determined you were using a black hole to power your time machine and it appears I was correct, and I am here to help you fix it! Do you have a reset button or kill switch!?"

"No! we are not resetting everything! I can fix it!" Richmond said angrily. "It is not past the point of no return!"

As he spoke Peabody noticed his eyes flit over to a lever that was sitting near the edge of the panel he was working at. Peabody deduced that it must be the reset lever and ran towards it and tried to flip it, but before he could, Richmond quickly reacted and punched him, making him go flying backward.

"Mr. Peabody!" Sherman cried out, rushing over to him.

"I don't think you heard me. I said I can fix it." Richmond glared at Peabody

Peabody slowly got up, feeling the place where Richmond had punched him. He wasn't bleeding, so that was good. He glared at him.

"Richmond, I intend to reset the timeline with or without your help." Loathing what he did next, but realizing it was possibly the only thing he could do in order to stop Richmond, he suddenly jumped forward and Richmond met him, and they began to fight, exchanging blows.

Sherman suddenly noticed he was having a hard time staying in one place, he was slowly being pulled toward the black hole, his shoes scraping along the metal flooring. Luckily there was a railing right in front of him that he grabbed that prevented him from being pulled further toward it.

Suddenly at the same moment, they all heard a loud shattering of breaking glass and Sherman gasped as he quickly looked behind him.

The windows of the control room had given in to the black hole's gravitational forces and shattered. Headed straight for him were some very large pieces of glass, their sharp edges glinting in the lab's bright light.

Peabody watched in horror as the large pieces of glass headed straight for Sherman, who was directly in their path towards the black hole.

He quickly dodged a punch from Richmond and ran for Sherman.

Calculations ran frantically in his mind's eye as he ran on all fours.

Sherman was barely able to see Mr. Peabody running towards him before he suddenly felt a push and felt himself falling to the side. "Mr. Peabody!" Sherman yelled as the beagle pushed the red-head away from the oncoming debris.

Sherman heard a loud dog-like yelp in pain and looked behind him to see Peabody lying against the railing, multiple pieces of glass embedded in him, his snow-white fur quickly turning red.

Suddenly the room shook and some of the metal support beams began to buckle. Richmond had returned to the control panel and began typing furiously onto the keyboard.

SUBJECT: S. PEABODY: DELETE MEMORY CACHE? Y/N

Richmond typed Y and pressed enter.

WARNING! MEMORY CACHE WILL NOT BE RESTORED IN EVENT OF TIMELINE RESET. ARE YOU SURE YOU WANT TO CONTINUE? Y/N

Richmond quickly typed Y without hesitation and pressed enter again.

Sherman ran up to Peabody.

"Mr. Peabody! I-I'm sorry! W-what should I do? What should I do?" His hands shook in fear as they hovered over the pieces of glass embedded in Peabody's stomach, unsure if he should pull them out or leave them in. That glass had been meant for him. He suddenly felt tears beginning to fall from his eyes. He couldn't explain them.

Peabody's words were punctuated by occasional whines in pain and ragged breaths.

"Sherman…you must…reset the timeline." He took Sherman's hand in one paw.

"I…love you Sherman. I promise you… everything will be alright." He said, smiling weakly at him.

Sherman looked at him in shock. "But what will happen?!"

"Everything will be… as it should be…" Peabody said, his eyes slowly opening and closing, his paw slipped from Sherman's hand.

Sherman looked at him for a few seconds more and then ran towards the reset lever, gripping it in both hands.

"What are you doing Sherman!?" Richmond pleaded as the boy reached the lever. "I can still fix this! He's a dog! A DOG! Don't you want a real family? A real father? He only saw you as charity, as just another good notch in his collar! Why would you go back to that…Who would want a dog as a father!?"

Sherman's eyes flickered with a barrage of emotions. Was that true? Is this all a lie? Would Peabody only see him as charity…

Who wants a dog for a father?

But as he looked over at Peabody, the life quickly draining from his body, Sherman knew he had his answer.

And so, with tears streaming down his face, he gave a hard look at Richmond. "Me."

He pulled the lever.


	12. Is Letting Go

_Peabody softly opened the door to Sherman's room. He needed to get Sherman to bed, but he wanted to do it with the least amount of protesting on Sherman's part. Suddenly, he had an idea._

 _"Sherman, you were a piano when you were younger." Peabody said as he walked up to him. He was sitting on the floor in his room playing with his toys._

 _Sherman looked up at him and giggled. "A piano, Mr. Peabody? You're funny, I'm not a piano, I'm a boy."_

 _Peabody chuckled and leaned down and nuzzled Sherman on the nose with his own, to which Sherman giggled again. "It is just a metaphor Sherman. When you play the piano, you need to be careful with it, you need to handle it with care. And that is what I did."_

 _Peabody picked Sherman up and started to gently rock him. "I would even sing it."_

 _As one who loved any moment his father would pick him up, Sherman didn't complain._

 _And Peabody started to sing and rock Sherman in his arms. "Oh, like a piano, I will handle you with such care..."_

 _And he continued to sing and rock Sherman until he fell asleep, then he carefully tucked him into bed and, after a slight pause, gave him a kiss on his forehead._

* * *

Whiteness. Whiteness and falling. Peabody couldn't explain it, but that was all he could see and all he could feel. It was so very bright… And suddenly it was gone. And he was on the floor muzzle-down. He groaned and moved his paws, trying to get a grip on the wooden floor. It was smooth… and as he looked at it through half closed eyes, he could see it was the same color and texture as the penthouse's floor...

He looked down at his body and noticed the glass pieces were gone, his fur was a pristine white again, and the pain was gone.

He opened his eyes fully and looked up. It was the penthouse, he was lying in the hallway and as he looked around he noticed that the pictures had been returned to their place on the memory wall.

He smiled widely. "Sherman must have done it. We're back."

He looked around and noticed Sherman was also lying on the floor and scrambled over to him.

"Sherman! Sherman! Are you alright?"

Sherman groaned and his eyes fluttered open. The moment his eyes fell on Peabody he gasped and sat up, throwing his arms around Peabody in a tight hug.

"You're alright! I was so scared!"

Peabody returned the hug, albeit slowly. He stared ahead with a blank look. Sherman shouldn't remember anything.

"Sherman…" Peabody said slowly as they broke apart he looked him in the eyes. "What is the last thing you remember?"

"I flipped the reset lever on the machine." Sherman said slowly, unsurely.

Peabody became frantic. It hadn't worked. Why hadn't it worked? He gripped Sherman's shoulders.

"Where did I take you for your 5th birthday?!" He asked, the urgency in his voice not lost on Sherman.

"I-I don't know! What's wrong Mr. Peabody?!"

Peabody didn't answer, he let go and put a paw to his forehead and began to turn around in confused fear. It hadn't worked, Sherman's memories weren't restored.

Despite his emotions running wild his mind still managed to begin working out a solution.

" _Since the pictures on the wall are back, the WABAC must be too. I can use it and erase this mess!"_

He began to run for the elevator.

Sherman began to run after him. "Wait, Mr. Peabody! What's wrong?! Why do I remember all that?!"

Peabody didn't answer, he didn't know what to say. He reached the elevator and frantically pushed the WABAC room's button.

"Where are you going?!" Sherman continued to run after him, but he wasn't fast enough. Peabody turned just as the doors closed and the last thing he saw was Sherman's terror filled face and heard him cry out pitifully: "Please don't leave me!"

* * *

As soon as the elevator doors opened Peabody ran as fast as his legs could carry him. A sob escaped his mouth. He had betrayed this Sherman's trust that Peabody loved him. Peabody just wanted his own Sherman back. The one with _their_ memories. The ones they shared. After all, what is a person without their memories? Did he truly love Sherman if all he cared about was getting a certain version of him back?

Peabody pushed all these thoughts down as he ran for the big red door, which was also back of course. The code was the same, so he punched it in and the door swung open. He jumped onto the red platform and ran up the stairs once it reached the WABAC. He jumped into the driver's seat and by that time had already determined what he needed to do. Richmond losing his daughter is what had caused him to build his time machine and make the timeline change. So Peabody deduced he must need to somehow save Richmond's daughter. The last moment she was ever seen was getting sucked into one of his portals, and that was at the NYTSE two months ago.

So he punched in the location and date, swiped to the manual override once the WABAC complained to him he was travelling to an era in which he existed, pressed the red button, and it whirred to life, spinning and generating slivers of blue light as it prepared to enter the wormhole and the timestream. He shot forward and was off.

Soon the WABAC shot out into the daylight and immediately cloaked. Peabody landed on the top level of the parking garage and rushed out.

He ran into the building and took the stairs to the floor he and Richmond had presented (were presenting?) on and slowed to a walk as he anxiously realized he could run into somebody and him running around while at the same time being in another room would cause some suspicion.

" _Maybe I can catch her as she's going to the bathroom…"_ He thought as he walked.

He then realized the hallway he was currently walking down was the same one he had walked down and met Richmond and Sophia those two months ago.

Suddenly, just as he was right near the end and about to exit the hallway, two things happened at almost the same time.

He heard a whoosh and a bright light appeared just to his right. He knew that sound. That was the sound his portal gun had made back when he demonstrated it two months ago in this very building.

A millisecond after that, someone passed right in front of him and he instantly realized it was Sophia.

"Ms. Wolf!" he grabbed her hand and pulled her over to where he was standing.

She, of course, was very surprised.

"Mr. Peabody?! What are you doing? Aren't you supposed to be on the stage?!" she asked, eyes wide and looking at him like he was a ghost.

"Yes, I am currently on the stage, but that is not the issue. I need to return you to your father."

Sophia shook her head. "I'm confused, how can you be in two places at once? And why do you need me to go to my dad? He's just in the audience in the auditorium." She began to walk towards the end of the hall again.

Peabody also suddenly looked like he had seen a ghost as he realized the time paradox he was now involved in.

"No!" He rushed forward and grabbed Sophia's hand and prevented her from exiting the hallway just in time.

"Why not?" she asked.

He had to explain. "Sophia, I am a time traveler. I come from two months into the future. I have created a time machine called the WABAC, and you and I are now involved in a time paradox. Your father is _currently_ under the impression that you are missing. That I kidnapped you. There is a security camera at the end of that hall that your father looked at when he believed you went missing. He only saw the portal from my portal gun and you getting pulled into it. The truth is, you never were. You are here now because I grabbed your hand and pulled you into this hallway. You father only believes you were sucked into the wormhole because of the angle of the security camera. He never saw you come out again. Because of that I both cannot let you be seen again and am led to believe that I am supposed to take you in the WABAC to some other time so I can undo the mess he's made of the timeline." He said frantically.

Sophia, for an 11-year-old, took the news much better than anyone else. She stared at him, then said in a nonchalant tone of voice: "Yeah, he makes messes a lot."

Peabody couldn't believe it; most people would immediately start asking questions and become really curious.

"So… you understand the predicament we are in?" he asked with an eyebrow raised.

"I think so, I'm guessing you can't be seen by your other self who is currently on the stage, and since events have progressed a certain way, you must make sure to keep them that way, otherwise it will disrupt the space time continuum."

Peabody was surprised, never had anyone grasped his explanation of time events so quickly. "Yes, that is exactly what is happening. When did you become so knowledgeable in time travel mechanics?" He smiled incredulously.

"My dad has dabbled in it before and explained it to me. It is still very confusing at times though." Sophia said. "But does this mean I get to see your time machine?" she asked excitedly as she hopped from one foot to the other.

"Yes, it does indeed. Come, quick!" Peabody said, smirking as he took her hand and they rushed down the hallway.

Luckily for them, mostly everyone in the building was already at the event, so they didn't meet anyone on their way to the top level of the parking garage.

As they approached it, Sophia saw the WABAC shimmer and suddenly a door opened in midair and red stairs flipped down and Peabody ran up them. Before she could realize that the stairs weren't attached to anything and react to it, she had run up them as well and into the machine.

"Those stairs weren't attached to anything! How did you do that?" she asked breathlessly.

"Oh, it was just a simple case of manipulating the superconducting properties of certain metals and the Meissner Effect and voila, I made floating stairs!" Peabody said enthusiastically as he sat down at the driver's seat.

Sophia then began to take in the craft she was in. She absently walked over to the passenger seat besides Peabody and sat down, all the while looking around in awe with her mouth open.

Peabody quickly typed in the coordinates and pressed the red button.

" _Singularity detected. Time travel not possible."_ The voice of the WABAC suddenly spoke.

Sophia watched as Peabody stared at the big red letters reading what the WABAC had just said. He looked shocked. But after a few seconds, he chuckled nervously.

"That's not right… it must be malfunctioning…" He entered the coordinates again and again the voice of the WABAC said the same thing.

He chuckled nervously again. "I must have entered the coordinates wrong." he tried a third time.

For the third time, the voice of the WABAC said the same thing.

"NO!" Peabody suddenly slammed his fisted paws onto the control panel touchscreen.

Sophia gasped and backed away. For the first time since meeting Mr. Peabody, she was genuinely afraid. He looked more and more like a regular dog now, growling in anger and his claws making scratches on the panel.

He slammed his paws on the panel again. "NO!"

His mind ran through other possibilities, but as each one failed, he slammed a paw on the panel, causing it to crack at the last moment.

Tears began to fall from his eyes as he succumbed to his emotions, ones he had tried for so long to keep under the surface but had been coaxed out of him, to his great joy, by the very person who could no longer enjoy them. His Sherman was gone. It was no use.

He stood up and picked up his chair and threw it at the door of the WABAC, yelling in anguish. He slid down the edge of the panel and sat down, sobbing and whining. He had failed to keep his promise to Sherman.

Sophia watched as he lay there, whining like a dog and crying. She waited for a few moments when the sobs and whines had lessened before spoke.

"Mr. Peabody?" she said quietly, hesitantly.

Peabody sniffled as he looked at her. "I… am so very sorry, Ms. Wolf. I lost control. I imagine you are very confused and frightened."

She nodded solemnly.

"Sherman… my son… is gone forever." Another sob escaped him as he said those words.

"He's…dead?" She asked.

"No, he's not, he simply does not remember the last rightful 7 ½ years of his life with me. And there is no way I can fix it." Peabody sniffed some tears back as he stood up and walked over to where he had thrown the chair.

"Your father created a time machine and altered the timeline so that I never adopted Sherman." He said as he carried the chair over and placed it back in its place.

He sat down in it. "Sherman reset the timeline so that everything was restored, including the WABAC, but his memories were not, and I do not understand why. I thought I could return you to your father before he created the time machine, and thus steer him on a different path. But because his machine is powered by a black hole I cannot."

"Why not?" she asked.

"A month ago, from my perspective, or a month from now, from yours, myself, Sherman and a friend of his were travelling in the WABAC when we encountered a black hole. We were almost sucked into it, and if it weren't for my quick thinking, we would not be here having this conversation. After that incident I upgraded the WABAC so that if it detects the presence of any kind of black hole or quantum singularity in the destination, it will refuse to time travel. Because a black hole is life threatening situation, I did not put in a manual override, no backdoor of any kind. That is why we cannot travel to a point where returning you to him would be effective in steering events in another direction, and because of that, I cannot return you to your father immediately, I will have to return you to him when I came from." Peabody began to type in the coordinates for the date and time he had just come from.

Sophia's eyes widened. "But that means he will have been without me for two months!"

Peabody nodded. "Yes, and time has played out as it always has."

He pushed the red button and the WABAC started up this time. They shot through the wormhole and were off.

The wormhole didn't do much to distract Sophia from what had just transpired, but she still opened her mouth in awe at the wormhole's blue light streaks.

Soon they shot out into the daylight, cloaked and Peabody landed the WABAC at the front door to Richmond's building.

They both walked out and up to the front door. This time, however, the door was locked. The key card light was red.

Peabody pulled on the door, but it didn't budge. Suddenly he realized what had happened.

The black hole was the likely reason the doors hadn't been locked, and because the timeline had been reset and Richmond had never used it they were back in working order.

Sophia walked up to a little button near the door. "Uhh, there's a bell." She pushed it.

She stood back next to Peabody and they both waited.

Soon they saw Richmond through the glass walking toward them. He saw them and immediately his face contorted into happiness and confusion at the same time.

He ran forward and opened the door. "Sophia!" He scooped her up in a hug and spun around. "Where have you been?! I missed you!"

"I just came from the bathroom, daddy…" she said solemnly, staring him in the face.

He stared back. "W-what, Soph? You're funny, it's been 2 months." He laughed, confused.

Richmond suddenly noticed Peabody, who was scowling at him in anger. "And what are you doing here, Hector? Did you have a change of heart?" he said derisively.

"I didn't kidnap your daughter, but you made me lose my son!" Peabody said angrily.

"It's true, he didn't kidnap me!" Sophia protested.

"It's true, I did not." Peabody said. "When the timeline reset, I discovered Sherman was without his previous memories for some unknown reason, and I endeavored to fix it by returning Sophia to you before you changed the timeline, but because **your** time machine uses a black hole to power it," he emphasized the word and growled slightly and looked at Richmond angrily. "I cannot, so I must return her to you now. I was the one who pulled Sophia into the hallway, to you, it looked like she was sucked into the wormhole, but I pulled her into the hallway beyond it."

Richmond stared at Peabody in silence, the full weight of his actions had finally settled on him. He had caused his own distress over Sophia's disappearance. If he hadn't created the time machine and changed the timeline, Sophia wouldn't have disappeared. Peabody would never have gone to get her. It was a vicious cycle. Peabody had gone to go get her because he had changed the timeline. He had changed the timeline because Peabody had gone to get her.

"So…you never… kidnapped her…" he said slowly.

"No, I did not. I am a lot more upstanding than you think Richmond." Peabody snapped. "I would never kidnap your daughter. And believe me, I know what having your child kidnapped feels like…"

Richmond said nothing, having finally been brought low.

"I… truly am sorry, Hector." He said slowly.

Peabody nodded. "I accept your apology, but I have nothing more to say to you, goodbye Richmond, consider this the end of our relationship, whatever it was before. I do not want to see you ever again." Peabody growled as he glared daggers at him.

"Goodbye Mr. Peabody." Sophia said quietly. "I'm really sorry about Sherman."

Peabody nodded at her. "Thank you, Ms. Wolf. Although Richmond is not entirely to blame. It is also my fault as well, if I hadn't implemented both the blocking of traveling to points in time where black holes exist, and shown off my wormhole generator at the expo two months ago, this would have never happened."

Peabody said goodbye to both of them and walked back to the WABAC and they began to walk back into the building.

"Well… I'm glad you're back." Richmond said as he smiled at Sophia. He truly was of course, it had been two months without her for him.

"Daddy, I literally came from the bathroom at the expo only 10 minutes ago…" she said as she looked at him. "But I'm glad you're happy again." She smiled.

"I feel sad for Mr. Peabody…" she said as they entered the elevator that would take them up to their penthouse.

"Yeah…"

Of course, Richmond knew that if he hadn't had Sherman's memories deleted when the timeline reset, he might never have gotten Sophia back.

But he didn't say anything to her about it of course. He had honestly just been toying with Peabody. He had completely intended to restore the timeline once he got Sophia back, but his decision to erase Sherman's memories even in the event of timeline reset directly caused him getting Sophia back. And that decision would kill him for the rest of his life.

* * *

Sherman's words echoed around in Peabody's head as he walked into the WABAC.

" _So…if a different… 'me' formed, would you adopt him too?"_

" _But, it would still be_ _ **me,**_ _right? … would you not love him?"_

He let out a sob as he sat down at the controls. He had failed to keep his promise.

However, there was still an orphaned boy at his penthouse who was alone. As he gazed out the window of the WABAC he realized his promise was twofold.

He had promised to restore the timeline to as it was, but failing that, he would take care of any versions of Sherman that formed ' _to the best of my ability.._.'

And so, sitting at the WABAC controls, he vowed to honor Sherman's literal memories by taking the child that was currently in his penthouse as his own.

"Goodbye, Sherman." He whispered to himself as he flew the WABAC over to it.


	13. Begin Again

Sherman sobbed as he sat on the penthouse floor. Richmond was right. Mr. Peabody didn't care about him.

" _He doesn't care about you…"_

Richmond's words echoed around in his mind as he sat on the floor.

He wanted Mrs. Harper or Mr. Harper, didn't matter which. But he was alone is this strange new world that was also familiar at the same time.

He sniffed back tears as he looked around and stood up. The penthouse was just as he remembered it; only now there were pictures on the walls, toys strewn about the living room, and marks on the walls from 7 years of a child's play.

Sherman noticed the memory wall and walked closer to it to get a better look.

He stood at the memory wall, looking at the framed newspaper clipping of his adoption, a couple tears streaming down his face.

Sherman knew his room must have something in it, according to Peabody it had been his after all.

He made his way to it and opened the door to look inside. He gasped as he took in the rooms contents. Almost every single toy he could remember he had admired and drooled at in toy shop windows in the other timeline must have been here. He wandered around the room, looking at them and absently taking a finger and making the newtons cradle swing back and forth. It was weird, knowing that all these toys were his. But he didn't want them, he wanted someone to comfort him, to help him make sense of this mess.

He sat down on the edge of the bed, looking towards the floor to ceiling windows that afforded him a glorious view of New York City.

He sat there for a few minutes, a few stray tears sliding down his face and sniffling occasionally when he suddenly heard the elevator ding. He stood up and ran out the door.

He entered the landing where the elevator was and saw Peabody step out of it. He looked up and noticed Sherman but didn't say anything.

Peabody took a few tentative steps forward and Sherman stayed where he was. After a few moments, the tension broke and they both rushed forward, catching each other in a hug.

Sherman sobbed into Peabody's fur as he held him.

"I'm sorry Sherman, I am so terribly sorry…" Peabody murmured as he rubbed Sherman's back and nuzzled his hair.

But Sherman didn't take the apology as Peabody intended it. Sherman was happy Peabody had come back to him, and that is what he assumed Peabody was sorry about. But to Peabody, Sherman was gone, and Peabody was sorry he couldn't save him. He had broken his promise.

Sherman could feel the paws rubbing his back and head, and he just melted into it. Just the fact Peabody had come back spoke volumes.

Richmond was wrong. Peabody did love him.

Suddenly he saw in his mind's eye him laughing at a pun Peabody had made that day he had lunch at his penthouse. He saw an almost wolf-like dog protecting him from the bullies. He saw a dog lying against a metal railing, glass that had been meant for him in his stomach, the blood and life quickly draining from him, saying 'I love you.'

All at once he realized Peabody wasn't lying. He did love Sherman. With all his heart.

Soon Sherman's sobs died down and Peabody's own throat wasn't so choked up.

They pulled apart hesitantly and looked each other in the eyes.

"Sherman…" Peabody began. "I…am sorry for leaving you."

"Where did you go?" Sherman asked, pushing his glasses up to wipe his eyes and his voice thick from crying.

"I attempted to reset the timeline on my own. But due to some changes I made to the WABAC I couldn't." Peabody said as little as possible. He wanted to avoid the issue that now plagued him.

The idea that the Sherman standing in front of him now was somehow 'lesser' than the one with his memories intact. He still looked, sounded, and… _almost_ acted like him.

But it wasn't him. And Peabody had to keep reminding himself of that.

"So…now what?" Sherman asked.

He watched as Peabody seemed to struggle to say his next words. "Well… if you want, you could remain here, adopted…as my son… Or… I can arrange that you be released from my custody and live in another foster home so you can be adopted by real parents. I will make sure you are placed in the utmost quality foster home. It will cause another media circus of course, but if that's what you want-"

"I want to stay." Sherman interrupted.

Peabody was speechless, he didn't know what to say.

"You're the only one I know anyways, and I'm sick of being in a foster home." Sherman continued.

Peabody tried holding his composure. "Of course, I would love to have you." He smiled.

Sherman smiled back.

Peabody's lip trembled as he looked at his son. He couldn't explain what he was feeling at this moment, but it had something to do with the fact Sherman had chosen to remain with him.

He threw his arms around Sherman in another hug and Sherman returned it.

Peabody learned that day there is a duality to love.

Love is a feeling. But it is also a choice.

In the days that followed, they went to the location of the Hard Rock orphanage, but discovered it had never existed, a different building was in its place.

As for school, Peabody quickly invited Penny over to their house and explained the situation. Penny was understandably distraught but agreed to work with Sherman on bringing him 'up to speed' on his 'new life.' Sherman's friends accepted him and he and Peabody began to go on trips in the WABAC again, with Penny occasionally joining them.

In all, life returned mostly back to normal, until the Christmas play.

* * *

 **2 months later**

"Dad! we're going to be late!" Sherman yelled as he pulled his fake beard on. "I'm the most important character in the play! I can't be late!"

Peabody smiled as he entered the living room. Sherman was dressed in red, literally all over.

He had a red coat on that had been hemmed with white fur along all the edges by Peabody himself, red pants that had also been trimmed with the same white fur, black boots, a Santa hat on his red hair, and a fake red beard pulled around his ears.

He looked, for all intents and purposes, like a mini Santa.

"Sherman, because you are the most important character in the play means the play will start when you get there, not the other way around." He chuckled.

Sherman held his arms out and turned around, showing off the costume.

"You look like the perfect Kris Kringle, if I do say so myself." Peabody smirked.

He chuckled. "You know this reminds me of the time you were four, and you-" he started, but was interrupted.

Sherman frowned sadly. "Dad… I…I don't remember that." He reminded him.

A single tear formed and slid down the fur on Peabody's face.

"I'm sorry, I forgot. No, I-I suppose you wouldn't…" He said sadly.

"M-maybe you can tell me about it after the play?" Sherman asked, smiling timidly.

Peabody smiled back, winking. "Even better, I'll show you."

Sherman grinned. "I can't wait."

Peabody's heart swelled. Behind the fake beard he could see that same lopsided grin he knew and loved.

He would always choose to love his little boy.

No matter what.

 **The End**

* * *

 _And the walls kept tumbling down_

 _In the city that we love_

 _Grey clouds roll over the hills_

 _Bringing darkness from above_

 _But if you close your eyes_

 _Does it almost feel like_

 _Nothing changed at all?_

 _And if you close your eyes_

 _Does it almost feel like_

 _You've been here before?_

 _How am I going to be an optimist about this?_

 _How am I going to be an optimist about this?_

 **Pompeii, Bastille**

 _There's always time for living,_

 _Can we just do it again?_

 _One more time like it once was_

 _Way back when_

 _You gave me something to believe in_

 _We were the best of friends_

 _Well I remember the good times_

 _Way back when_

 _Memories will fade_

 _If you wanted me to let you go_

 _I'll guide you on your way_

 _I'll be there for you, don't you know_

 _It's a promise that I made,_

 _Never be afraid_

 _I know we'll be okay,_

 _This love we have it cannot go_

 **Way Back When, Grizfolk**

 **For the first time ever, I will be practically begging for reviews. Please, please, PLEASE review. I desperately want to know what you thought of this story. Hope you enjoyed it, and check out the next chapter for my chapter commentary.**

 **So that will be the last time for awhile I write a fic in full and then post it. Any new fics by me will definitely be posted as they are written. I've got one request that I already have an idea for that I'm pretty sure has not been done before, and a tentative next chapter for Time is a Matter of Perspective.**


	14. Chapter Commentary

Chapter 2:

Yes, I was imagining the exact science fair from Meet the Robinsons, but obviously the events and circumstances were much different. And yes, the names of the other kids were also nods, and yes, I spelled Lewis' name wrong on purpose. Originally, this chapter was going to be what chapter 9 is now, but then I decided to place it later, in order to create mystery surrounding the villain. I knew from the beginning that I wanted the science fair to be first, and because of that nothing in this chapter never really changed that drastically. I originally planned to have them go to an ice cream place and get ice cream in celebration, but cut that out because I accomplished most of the memory related bits at the science fair, and the chapter was getting too long, which leads into…

Chapter 3:

I originally was going to include this chapter in chapter 2, but it had become too long. The first part with the villain was originally included with chapter 9 placed at the end, but I included it here to give readers a sense of the villain. This chapter also serves as Peabody's 'goodbye' to his version of Sherman, only he doesn't know that at the time.

Chapter 4:

This is of course an 'introduction' chapter, Sherman's lived in foster homes all his life, he wants to be adopted eventually, like any orphan, shows his home life, etc. I also introduced every single one of the OCs in this chapter, the most important I consider to be are Mrs. Harper, Mr. Harper, and James. Jayce, Jayden, and Sophia I added simply because Disney-diligent had had mentioned in one of their posts that Sherman had 'foster sibling **S** ' Mrs. Harper serves as Sherman's 'suspicious' side, Mr. Harper serves as Sherman's 'optimistic' side, and James is, of course, Sherman's 'father figure.' I originally was going to have a whole mysterious subplot of a couple coming to the foster home to adopt Sherman, having been setup to adopt him by Richmond who was acting as a social worker, but simply didn't have room for them, so that saved me from developing two other OCs.

Chapter 5:

Here's where Mrs. Harper begins to become suspicious. You've got the whole conversation with Peabody, he has to lie/leave things out, because obviously he can't reveal he's a time traveler, who knows what could happen. Regardless, Mrs. Harper becomes suspicious. Not much of anything to talk about and nothing really changed with this chapter.

Chapter 6:

This chapter is where Sherman finally has some alone time with Peabody and learns more about this previous life he had, at first I thought I would combine this and chapter 8, but I wanted Peabody to visit Hard Rock multiple times in order for the nod to PIH to work.

Chapter 7:

Pretty happy with the way that nod to the first episode of PIH turned out. I also knew I wanted to get all the inhabitants of Hard Rock 'on the same page'-ish eventually, and so I did it here.

Chapter 8:

This was my first attempt at trying to be different and do different things, the entire next chapter is essentially a flashback, but obviously it's waaaayyy too long to be contained and italicized by itself. So, I thought it would be interesting to segue both into and out of the flashback using chapter marks. The news reporter bit also serves as the catalyst for Sherman's doubt in chapter 10. Also anyone who can spot the Easter egg in this chapter gets a cookie.

Chapter 9:

I swapped so many times between having this happen either two months before the story or 7 years before the story. Mainly because I wasn't sure if I could have Richmond invent his own time machine in such a short time, but then realized if Peabody can invent a time machine in roughly 6 months, then so can another genius. Another issue I encountered was with my villain. This was my first time writing a real villain, Martin from Ransomed Memories wasn't a villain per se, and his motivation was clear and obvious. With Richmond I knew I couldn't just make jealousy his sole motivation, so I had to come up with something. So I thought maybe if Peabody did something to him… but then realized that Peabody's too upstanding to 'do anything' to anyone. So I then wondered if maybe I could make it a misunderstanding, so Richmond would think Peabody 'did something' to his daughter, but Peabody would have no idea. That led to the way it is now, where Peabody realizes that, due to the angle of the security camera, it looked to Richmond like she was sucked into the wormhole, when in fact future Peabody had grabbed her hand and pulled her into the hallway just beyond it. Still haven't been able to explain **why** the wormhole appears in that hallway, the best guess I have is that it was attracted to the future Peabody.

Chapter 10:

Richmond doesn't tell Peabody the events of the entire previous chapter, he starts around the point Peabody begins his demonstration. This chapter was a late add. I knew I wanted to give Sherman some doubt against Peabody's story at some point, but then come around. This also served as the way Sherman interacts with and knows who the villain is too. This also serves as Sherman's goodbye to his foster family. The dread Peabody and Sherman feel in Chapter 3 and 10 respectively was on purpose and is an allusion to a sort of headcanon I have. Because of their intense and prolonged 7 1/2 years of exposure to time travel, they have essentially 'become one' with the time space continuum, 'time energy', or whatever you want to call it and have some sort of subconscious precognition of future time altering events, namely ones that will result in emotional pain: Peabody losing his version of Sherman, and Sherman losing the Harpers.

Chapter 11:

 **Chapter Theme Song:** _No Time For Caution_ by Hans Zimmer from the Interstellar soundtrack

This was, and remains, the most nebulous part of the story. I was never sure exactly how they would get to where Richmond was, I also wasn't sure how many times they would interact with Richmond before the climax, but given he already interacted with both of them at least once before, I figured they could go to where Richmond was and be done with it. In disney-diligent's posts, there's a part (which I'm assuming they meant to be the end) where Sherman and Peabody are with the villain, and they say that things get thrown around, but never specified who (or what) threw them. So I added the black hole and made it so that it would get bigger and begin sucking in things. This also reverses the doubt Sherman had by having Peabody display a massive amount of self sacrifice and jump in front of pieces of glass headed for Sherman that cuts into him, leaving him incapacitated, forcing Sherman to be the one to have to pull the switch and reset everything.

Chapter 12:

Originally this was going to be the last chapter, but since I added Richmond's daughter aspect after I starting writing, I knew I wanted a resolution to that as well, so this is Peabody completing the paradoxical loop and pulling her into the hallway. She also serves as the person who is there when Peabody finally realizes that the micro singularity/black hole Richmond created in order to make his machine work has created a fixed point in time Peabody cannot change, because the WABAC refuses to go near it since he added that to its subroutines with no backdoor from the black hole incident in the movie. He can only travel to the points before the black hole was created and after it closed. Obviously, he can't go before because that was when Sophia was around, but if he goes after, he can't change anything, and so he realizes this with Sophia in the WABAC with him. He sadly pilots the WABAC to Richmond's lab and Richmond gratefully embraces her, he hasn't seen her for 2 months, but it's only been minutes for Sophia. One of the really interesting things I think I've determined about Peabody's character is that because of his arrogance, he has a tendency to make things 'his' fault too, even when they may not be and while he and people around him may not see that as a problem, it could also be seen as him attributing even mistakes to himself as part of his arrogant nature which, while I think was definitely mellowed out after he adopted Sherman, is definitely still a part of his core personality. So that's where the whole 'it's my fault' bit came from, along with his apology to Sherman in the next chapter, who of course doesn't take it that way and takes it a different way.

Chapter 13:

I swapped so many times between the story's current ending, and a happier ending where Sherman regains his memories, and is none the wiser, but Peabody remembers everything; but it felt waaayyy too much like Ransomed Memories' ending. Of course, there are many story beats in the whole fic that feel very Ransomed Memories-esque, but it's still obviously very different. One brief idea I had was Sherman's memories from the two timelines combined but trashed that idea pretty fast. If I would have gone with any kind of happy ending, the title wouldn't make much sense, and the song verses would not have hit as hard emotionally. So Peabody has to come to terms with a very different Sherman now, which he sort of already has throughout the entire story. I didn't want another Ransomed Memories ending, so I made sure to make it so that everything can't be restored. This story has consequences that I'm not going to just negate by everything going back to normal. Sure, Peabody might remember everything, and Sherman is none the wiser, but nothing changes. The characters have to learn from their choices/mistakes and live with the consequences. Regardless of Sherman's memories and personality, Peabody must keep loving Sherman, with his foster care trauma, emotional baggage, and all, like he recently (from his POV) learned… But he still remembers his memories of Sherman as a baby, which he doesn't share with him anymore. And that's sad, but such is the life of a time traveler… I imagined Peabody tells Sherman about everything he remembers and shows him all the pictures and physical memories he has and showing him directly using the WABAC. So it's not all sad. And that's where the epilogue at the end came from.


End file.
